No Time Left
by Barbara Morehouse
Summary: Time has passed since the three hunters parted ways in Arkansas. Sam died, Dean gave up his soul for him, and the world is in trouble. Will bringing Alyssa back help Dean find his desire to live, or will it just drive him deeper into the pits of hell?
1. Chapter 1

**Chapter One**

Sam lay on the motel room bed, awake, unable to find comfort enough to allow sleep to take him. He could only watch the play of red and orange lights on the ceiling from the outside signs blinking on and off through the curtains.

Dean, however, was snoring away, oblivious to his brother's mental and emotional turmoil.

It had been a week since they'd face the Yellow-Eyed Demon and prevailed, a week since Hell's Gate had been opened releasing an untold number of demons upon the unsuspecting human world. And it had been only a couple of days since their encounter with the Seven Deadly Sins.

Sam thought about the hunter they'd lost in their fight with the demon horde, Tamara's husband, Isaac. It was an unfortunate loss, but more than that, it had been a wakening moment for Sam.

Since discovering Dean's crossroad deal to bring him back from death, Sam had endured his brother's reckless and carefree behavior with nothing more than a shrug, believing he owed him everything, no matter how despicable it seemed. He'd stood by while Dean bedded any willing woman, ate anything in sight, and consumed alcohol as if it were water. Dean's excuse was always that he was dead in one year, so he wasn't going to sweat the small stuff. He'd even gone so far as to try and use himself as a sacrificial lamb as he and Bobby were to make their escape from the Seven Deadly Sins. Something was definitely amiss with his brother.

The revelation of his brother's deal also brought with it a disturbing condition. If either he or Dean tried to find a way out of the deal, he, not Dean, would drop dead. No matter what they did, what they came up with, or what they discovered about the demon's deal, one of them would be condemned to an eternity in Hell.

Dean's nonchalant acceptance of his fate bothered Sam even more than his behavior. It seemed as if his older brother was looking forward to his imminent death.

He'd said he was tired, but Dean never explained of what he was tired. Was he tired of being his brother, of always ending up in another two-bit town, of not have a home, a family, or friends, of following in their father's footsteps, or maybe just tired of being alive? Maybe he was tired of it all.

Sam listened to his older brother's breathing as he slept, considering what his life would be like without him, but he couldn't bring himself to the point of acknowledging the possibility that he could be the last Winchester left alive.

It felt as if a lightning bolt had hit him. Sam sat up in the bed, looking at his brother's unconscious form. He wasn't the last Winchester.

Sam slowly and as quietly as possible moved off the bed, grabbing his cell phone from the nightstand, and headed for the bathroom to find some privacy for the necessary phone call. It seemed like forever before the other line picked up.

"Bobby?" Sam whispered as loud as he could in the small, echoing bathroom. The voice on the other end sounded groggy, as if he'd been awakened.

"Sam?" came the sleepy response.

"Sorry, Bobby. Did I wake you?"

"No, I'm usually wide awake in the middle of the night." His voice was thick with sarcasm.

Sam chuckled, knowing Bobby didn't mean it. At least, he didn't think he did.

"What's up, kid?"

"Bobby, can you find Alyssa?" Sam was near to tears thinking of the woman who had come into his brother's life, nearly died to save them from the Demon, and now carried his nephew in her womb.

Alyssa was Dean's old girlfriend from a decade or so ago. She'd disappeared after a short relationship with him, telling no one where she had gone.

Ten years later, she found him and Dean in a little motel room in Arizona. She became embroiled in the Yellow-Eyed Demon's plans to awaken the demon within him, but her love for Dean prevented the worst from happening, almost at the cost of her own life.

And somehow, in the midst of all the evil happening around them, a miracle had occurred. Alyssa, barren from the day she was born, had conceived a child, Dean's child, a son.

To keep her and the baby safe, she'd been sent away, her whereabouts unknown to everyone, including her adopted father, Bobby.

"Why? What's up?" Bobby was suddenly alert, sleep no longer important.

"Nothin'." Sam tried to sound as if the world was just fine.

"Sam, what is going on?" Bobby pressed a little more harshly.

Sam let out a deep sigh and explained to their surrogate father what he had seen in Dean's behavior and his own thoughts about what was happening in the stubborn mind of his older brother.

There was a dreadfully long pause on the other end of the phone.

"Bobby, you still there?" Sam thought the call had been dropped.

"Swing back my way, Sam."

"When?"

"Soon."

And with that, the line went dead in his hand.

Sam crawled back into the bed, covering himself with the blankets. He felt better, more at ease, now that he'd shared his burden with Bobby. And he knew their old friend would do something to help him deal with Dean's new look on life. Finding Alyssa and bringing her back into the picture could be the first step. Now all he had to do was get Dean back to South Dakota, somehow.

He heard his brother moan in bit in his sleep. Dean was apparently having a dream, and Sam hoped it was a good one, because he knew the nightmares were coming.

Dean never heard Sam leave the room, never knew what his younger brother had been up to in the bathroom. He'd slept through it all, unable to escape from the endless cycle of his repeated dreaming. The dreams started out the same: Sam was dead. He was surrounded by demons. But something had changed in this dream, it was different.

He heard the roar of the demon's escaping through Hell's Gate. He looked to his left expecting to see his brother standing next to him ready to fight, but instead Sam's lifeless body was lying on a grave, demon's twisting around him. He was about to scream Sam's name, when he felt a hand on his elbow. Dean turned around and came face-to-face with Alyssa.

She was standing in the middle of the cemetery dressed in her usual clothes: jeans, tank top, and biker boots. Her long brown hair whipped around her as the demon's swirled through the air.

"Alyssa, what are you doing here? Help me get Sam. He's not supposed to be there." He pointed at the grave where his younger brother lay motionless.

Alyssa took a hold of Dean's hands, pulling her to him, and whispered in his ear.

The cemetery scene dissolved into the salvage yard, Bobby's home, and her home. They were standing in the middle of rows and rows of automotive skeletons.

"Where's Sam?" Dean looked around nervously for his lost brother.

"Dean, he's safe." She kept the talking to a minimum. The dream world was not a place to play around in, and from experience, the less conversation there was between her and the dreamer, the better.

Alyssa held his face in her hands, seeming to bear the weight of his life. She kissed him gently, feeling him gradually giving into her.

His arms wrapped her to him as he pulled her to the blanket on the grass. The dream had changed again, this time setting them in the past, the day of her eighteenth birthday.

Reluctantly pulling her lips from his, she looked into his eyes, "Dean, we're coming home." She kissed him once again before dissolving into nothingness.

Dean woke briefly with the sensation of her kiss still tingling across his lips and the warmth of her body against his slowly cooling. He turned over in the bed, seeing his brother's back facing him on the other motel bed.

His brother was alive, making the deal still solid as ever. Dean looked at his watch. It was quarter to three in the morning. There was still plenty of time before they had to get moving again, so he rolled back over and promptly fell back asleep.

Bobby sat on the edge of his bed, thinking about what he'd just heard from Sam. Dean had always been the troublemaker, the thickheaded sibling: almost the perfect copy of his father, John.

When he'd seen Sam alive again, he'd known exactly what Dean had done. After everything the family had been through with the loss of their mother and their father's demon deal to save Dean, his heart broke to know Dean had gone and done the very same thing to save Sam. Bobby was hoping it was all a bad nightmare, and he'd wake up soon, but it was true, only Dean was given one year to live, not the usual ten years gifted to those who were desperate enough to barter with a demon.

Bobby thought about Dean's behavior during their fight with the Seven Deadly Sins. He'd acted as if he was untouchable, that no matter what he did, he wouldn't die because his soul was already bought and paid for. If only he knew how happy the demons would be to have him ahead of schedule, then maybe Dean wouldn't think so lightly of what he'd promised for himself.

Sam was worried about his brother too, and he seemed to think Alyssa could do something to help. Bobby was optimistic she could, but he wasn't sure if this was the time and place to call her back.

One phone call is all it would take to bring her home. He'd missed his adopted daughter terribly and wondered how she was doing on a daily basis. After all, he was going to be a grandfather in a few months. It was exciting and heart breaking at the same time.

Bobby flipped open his phone once again and found his contact. He waited for the other line to pick up.

"It's Bobby. Send the piper home, the rats want to play. Thanks." He hung up knowing Alyssa would be on her way home soon. Hopefully, she arrived before the boys did. He wanted to spend some time with his daughter before the fireworks went off. He lay back down on the bed and waited for the Sandman to dust his eyelids one more time tonight.

The darkness outside the car's windows seemed thicker, more oppressive than ever. Inky blackness swarmed in from all sides, as if trying to suffocate her. The only escape from it came by way of the Camaro's headlights cutting through the night like dual swords of radiance.

Alyssa's cell phone rang, the tune of AC/DC's Highway to Hell playing to let her know someone was calling. It wasn't Bobby, Dean, or Sam, as each of their ring tones was different. This was a phone call from someone else. She answered the phone while she drove through the night.

"Got it. Thanks." The message was loud and clear. Bobby was telling her it was safe to come home, but she already knew that. She'd just woken up from a desperately needed nap, and was on the road again.

The brief dream walk with Dean had been a bit disturbing. She'd seen Sam's body lying on a grave, the demons all around her, and the pained look in Dean's eyes. Something was very wrong, and she had a hunch about it all, but she didn't want to think about it right now. There was something more pressing on her mind.

She'd been on her way to South Dakota yesterday. It was slow going as she was driving alone, and she was very susceptible to needing more sleep this late in her pregnancy, but considering the circumstances she was making good time, and she'd be home in less than four hours.

The past six months had dragged on day by day, but now it seemed as if it had flown by without her noticing. Of course, her swelling stomach was proof enough of how much time had passed. The miracle of the life growing inside her was her daily reminder of who and what she'd left behind.

What she had left behind was better than what she knew she was headed towards. When she'd last seen Sam, Dean, and Bobby, the world wasn't in the midst of a demon war. The human world knew nothing of what truly lay beyond the edges of the nightmares.

Now, those nightmares would become reality. Humans were under attack from a war they never knew was brewing. And it seemed the Winchesters were in the center of it all.

Alyssa absent-mindedly laid a hand on her dull brown leather bag in the passenger seat. Inside the bag was her sketchbook, the sketchbook where she drew her visions. It was sort of her diary, but instead of writing about her fantasies or wishes, she drew pictures of the visions that came to her, the visions that directed her to new cases, the same visions that had brought her back into the lives of the Winchesters.

Her mind kept going over what she'd seen in her dreams and the vision she'd drawn in her sketchbook. She had consulted with her spirit guides, but they had been no help with interpreting the images she'd seen.

Her desperation to know the truth impelled her to drive as much as she possibly could without putting herself or her unborn son at risk. Most times the pure exhaustion was kept at bay with the adrenaline pumping through her body. She needed to know what had transpired with Sam and Dean, and she just couldn't drive fast enough.

She needed to get as many miles behind her as she could before she needed to stop for another nap, so Alyssa leaned on the accelerator more, spurring the car on faster, cutting through the night.

"So, why do we need to go back to Bobby's?" Dean wasn't in a good mood this morning.

"He said he had something for us." Sam tried to keep the atmosphere in the car light and cheery, not wanting to give away that he knew what Bobby was up to and his part in it.

"Well, it better be good." Dean stepped on the Impala's accelerator lurching the car forward, sending them speeding along the road.

"He said it was important. That's all I know." He lied.

Dean grunted his disapproval of having to drive back to South Dakota. His plans to live up his last year of life were being thwarted by his brother and now Alyssa.

He hadn't thought of her much lately. He spent the first few weeks after their departure from Arkansas drowning her face in the flesh of women and booze. He was finally able to think of someone and something else until last night.

The dream started out the same as it had every night for the past week, but she'd shown up, changing it, and he knew it had been on purpose. He knew she could walk into anyone's dreams, tell them anything, and make them do anything.

It never sit well with him knowing she'd been in his head before she'd come back into his life, and it still bothered him that she could find him just by jumping into his thoughts and feelings while he slept.

His thoughts were his own, and he didn't like sharing. He hadn't told Sam about the nightmares, and he wasn't planning on telling him. It was his own problem and he would deal with it in his own way, but if it really was Alyssa in his dream last night, then she knew something about Sam, but did she know about the deal?


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter Two**

She pulled her dark blue 1968 Camaro past the Singer Salvage Yard sign, relishing in the familiar twinge of being home. The pit of fear in her stomach eased up a bit as she pulled the car up to the house.

Bobby heard the engine echo through the yard. His heart seemed to jump into his throat hoping it was Alyssa. He made it to the front door just as she was closing the door of her car.

"Hi, Bobby." The smile on her face would never have been able to accurately convey just how happy she was to see his loving blue eyes again.

"Hey, kiddo." His arms opened wide for her, tears stinging the corners of his eyes.

She let him take her in a deep hug, allowing herself the comfort of someone else bearing the weight of her burdens, if at least for only a moment.

They stood there for what seemed like eternity, just holding each other as a father and daughter would after a long separation.

He had so many questions to ask her, so many things he wanted to know about the last six months, but he didn't speak, he couldn't speak. He knew she'd tell him if he asked, but for right now, he only wanted to hold her, feel that she was really back, and enjoy seeing his adopted daughter…no, he didn't think of her as adopted any longer...she was his daughter, pure and simple.

Alyssa could literally feel the warmth of Bobby's love spreading from her arms through her entire body. She was home again. The man who had raised her like his own from the age of fourteen seemed to never want to let her go. At least, that's what the tightened arms around her seemed to convey. And she would be more than happy to let him keep her forever, if it meant she would never be alone again.

"Bobby, we can't stay like this forever." She mumbled against his flannel shirt.

"I know. Wish we could though." He released her slowly, drawing himself back to get a good look at her. "Wow, not much longer, huh?" He glanced down at her very pregnant belly. Her long brown hair had grown at least another four inches since he'd seen her last in Arkansas, and her skin had a glow about it. He'd always heard pregnant women glowed, but now he could see it for himself.

"Not much longer. He's kicking like a soccer star, too." She took Bobby's hand and placed on the side of her swollen belly.

Bobby's blue eyes widened with surprise at the sensation of an unborn life moving inside of her.

"Does it hurt?"

"No. It just takes my breath away when he really gets going." She chuckled a bit at his reaction.

"Well, come on then. Let's get you inside. You look like you need to rest. Are you thirsty?" Bobby turned from her and held the door opened for her.

"Thanks. Didn't think I looked that bad. And I could use some water." She stepped across the threshold, feeling safe and loved. She was home.

The sun reached its peak as noon grew closer, and the salvage yard was just on the horizon.

Sam's apprehension grew, as he saw they were closing in on their destination, knowing the truth was about to take place. As far as Dean knew, he didn't have a clue why Bobby wanted them to return to the yard, and he needed to keep it that way until they arrived.

Dean grumbled and moaned the whole way. He felt they could be taking the time to find new cases, hunt down some more of the demons that had escaped from Hell's Gate, or even enjoy the company of a few frisky blondes. But his younger brother was dead set on finding out what Bobby had for them, thus removing all fun from this particular trip.

The Impala obeyed as Dean turned her through the opened gates and past the Singer Salvage Yard sign.

"Son of a bitch."

"What?" Sam sat up a bit in the passenger seat, looking out the windows, searching for what his brother had seen. There, up ahead of them, parked outside Bobby's house was the reason for Dean's outburst: a blue Camaro.

"Did you know she would be here?" Dean glowered at Sam.

"No." he replied flatly avoiding his brother's intense stare.

"You did, didn't you? You knew. What'd you do? Call Bobby and tell him to bring her home? He was the only one who could find her." Dean searched his brother's eyes for the truth.

"Dammit, Sam!" Dean hit the steering wheel with the palm of his hand in frustration.

It was too late now. Bobby had probably heard the engine, and they couldn't very well turn around without stopping in. It would have alarmed Bobby, and then he would have been off after them trying to find out why they didn't stop and check in.

Sam didn't let Dean's emotions sway his original intent. He wanted to know if Alyssa could help him get Dean off his self-destructive track and hopefully instill in him the will and desire to want to fight his deal, find a way to break it.

Dean parked the Impala next to the Camaro, seeing the other car was clean and waxed. He looked out at the hood of his baby just taking notice of the dirt and dust covering her, chastising himself for not taking better care of her. She'd get a bath as soon as they were away from here.

Sam got out and started towards the door of the house. Noticing Dean wasn't following close behind him, he stopped and looked back. Dean was still in the car, fuming. Sam motioned for his brother to follow him.

Dean rolled his eyes and opened his door. The next chance he had, Sam was due a serious beating for doing this to him.

Sam knocked on the door and waited for it to open. He kept his head turned away from Dean, fearing to see the look in his eyes.

"Hey, boys. Come on in." Bobby greeted them and stepped away from the door. They could close it on their own.

"Hi, Bobby." Sam spoke first, his eyes searching the house for her.

"You guys want a beer?" Bobby disappeared into the kitchen.

"Sure." Sam responded when he didn't hear Dean answer.

"Drinking this early in the day? Must have been a hard drive." The gentle voice came from the stairwell that led to the second floor where the bedrooms were located.

Sam and Dean turned towards the voice. She seemed to glide down the steps as if her feet never touched the ground.

Dean's heart stopped for a beat, seeing her again. Her hair had grown a lot in the last six months, as had her belly. His son was in there, a child he would never know. He turned away from her heading for the kitchen to get his beer.

"Hey, Alyssa. You look great." Sam held his arms open for her.

"Thanks. Feel like a hippo these days." She stepped into his embrace, wrapping her arms around, settling her hands against the center of his back.

A shock went through her hands, traveled up her arms, and settled an icy cold stone into the center of her chest. She reacted to the sensation, drawing back from Sam quickly.

"Are you okay?" Alyssa looked into the brown eyes of the man in her arms and saw a deep sadness and fear, but also something else, something hollow.

"Yeah, I'm fine." Sam wasn't sure what she was referring to, but he knew she had felt something when she touched his back.

The wound that had taken his life was still healing. It hurt to move sometimes, but he suffered through it, understanding and accepting the sacrifice that had come with it.

Bobby and Dean rejoined Sam and Alyssa with beers in hand.

"You." Alyssa gestured with a nod of her head, looking directly at Dean. "Come on. I need your help." She stopped at the door, the knob in hand, and looked back to make sure Dean was following. Seeing he hadn't budged, she repeated herself. "Come on. Now."

Dean again shot Sam a hostile look and followed instructions. He really didn't want to go, but hanging back and ignoring her was not an option. She'd probably just drag him outside by his ears.

When they were finally outside and standing by the Camaro, Alyssa reached in the open window and pulled out her leather bag.

"Here," she said, digging through the beaten up bag and handing him her sketchbook.

"This is what you needed my help with?" he cocked an eyebrow at her.

The fluttering in her stomach was not the baby kicking this time. That look always sent her heart pounding and her blood racing.

"Just open it to the last page," she ordered him, keeping herself in check and not allowing him to see how he affected her. This was not the time to let her true emotions get the best of her. She was a hunter after all, and she needed to remain so for the moment.

Dean did as he was told, as it was best to not get her all riled up right now. She had that air about her that told him to not even start an argument, so he didn't. He turned the pages of the book, seeing the images he remembered from their previous encounter with the demon.

Beyond those pages were more images of visions she'd had while they were apart. Her visions led her to hunts, much like Sam's visions had. From the amount of pages that were filled, she'd been busy the last six months. The last sketch in the book shook him, reminding him of that night, the night Sam died.

In the center of the page, she'd drawn Sam's lifeless, ashen body, just as he had laid him on the bed. In the upper left corner was a rough sketch of a crossroads, most likely the same one he'd found. In the bottom right corner of the page were the red eyes of a demon. Apparently, she'd started using colored pencils in her drawings, or maybe this was just a special occasion.

"Tell me that doesn't mean what I think it does," her finger lay on the demon.

"When did you see this?" Could she have stopped all this from happening?

"Doesn't matter when, Dean. What matters is did you do this?" Her eyes were hard, looking into him, searching his soul for the lie he wanted to tell her.

But he knew better. Bobby, Ellen, and even Sam knew what he'd done. She'd find out sooner or later, and lying to her wasn't in his best interest, especially if he wanted to live the entire year.

"Yeah. I did it." He saw the fear cross her face, fleetingly, but it was there.

The fury within her, the fear she had felt since having the vision surfaced, boiling over.

"You made the deal?" She spoke through gritted teeth, her fists clenching at her side, whitening her knuckles and digging her trimmed nails into the flesh of her palms. "Did you get the usual time?"

Dean again scanned the sketch, recalling every single moment of that night, remembering the desperation, the sense of being lost without his brother, the thought that he had failed his father, failed Sam.

"Dean, did you get the ten years?" Her anxiety level rose as she awaited his response.

"No," he answered, avoiding her eyes.

"How long did you get?" His face paled a bit, revealing to her the news wasn't going to be good.

"One year. I got one year." He finally brought his eyes to meet hers, waiting for the tears to fall as they had with Sam and Bobby.

It may have been the bottled up rage within her. It could have been just instincts that made her move, but before Alyssa could think clearly, her right fist was soaring through the air, connecting with Dean's chin. The force of the impact reverberated through her bones ending in her chest.

Dean never saw the blow coming, but he recognized the sensation and stars shooting across his vision. His head took the force of the punch nearly blacking him out.

"Sonuvabitch!" Dean cried as he held his throbbing face.

"Don't you say a word, Dean Winchester!" she hissed at him. "Don't say a word."

Alyssa was visibly shaking with the fury, unable to close herself off and remain the cool, calm hunter she'd been trained to be.

There was a virtual tornado roaring through her heart and mind, consuming her, leaving behind devastation and loss. She couldn't believe her greatest fear since having the vision had become reality. The man before her was sure as dead, not in ten years, but in one year.

One year to find a way to help him. One year to save his life. One year to tell him how she felt about him. It wasn't nearly enough time.

Finding some semblance of control, her breath steady, Alyssa found the words to begin.

"What the hell were you thinking?"

"He was dead, Alyssa." Dean cradled his chin.

"So, you go and make a deal to bring him back, selling your soul in one lousy year?" Alyssa tried to remain solid as a wall, keeping her emotions tied up within her heart.

"I couldn't let him die, Alyssa. He's my brother. I'm supposed to save him."

"Dean, don't you think I know what that's like?" Thoughts of her brother, Zachary, flashed across her mind.

Zach had been one of the Yellow-Eyed Demon's chosen children, gifted with a deadly power, the ability to crush anything: bones, organs, whole bodies.

To try and save her brother from the destiny that seemed to have been set before them, Alyssa had spirited Zachary off to their cabin in the Arkansas Mountains, hoping to bring him back to reality.

But reality had been devastating. Though she tried every method she could think of to cleanse, bless, or exorcise her brother, she had failed to bring him back from the depths of his insanity. He was no longer the child she'd grown up with, the boy with whom she'd spent birthdays throwing cake, the sibling with whom she'd shared the special gift of telepathy. He was set on becoming whatever the demon had chosen for him.

After what seemed like an eternity, Alyssa had made the heart-wrenching decision to give her brother one more chance to come home to her.

She'd sat across from Zach at the large dining table in the cabin, a gun hidden below the table out of view and begged him to return to her, to be her brother once again.

Zach's response to her pleas was to inform her she had been chosen for a greater destiny than he could ever hope for. He would be in the war against humanity, a soldier of great value and strength, but she would be the key to their success. The man with the yellow eyes had chosen them for such a great honor.

Her world shattered around her. She'd failed to save her brother, and the only way she could think of to save the rest of the world from Zachary was to end his life.

She'd pulled the trigger, feeling the bullet leaving the barrel, and watched as her brother fell from his chair, blood pouring from the hole in his chest.

She'd held him in her arms as he pleaded for her forgiveness and thanked her for setting him free.

For months afterwards, Alyssa struggled with what she had done. She was all that was left of her family.

Her mother was murdered by a demon that possessed her father. Her father died in prison, most likely from another possessed inmate, wanting to keep the secrets of the demon world from her. And by her own hand, she had ended the life of the last person with whom she shared a blood connection.

To smother her thoughts and feelings, Alyssa decided to find out as much as she could about the other demon-chosen children. Her journeys had led her to Dean and Sam, who were also mixed up in the Yellow-Eyed Demon's plans.

After a lengthy time of being completely alone, Alyssa finally felt as if she had a family once again. Bobby was her adopted father, but now she had Dean and Sam to consider hers as well.

Together, they'd triumphed over the demon, ending his one plan to bring Sam to his side. But now it seemed as if the demons had won, but this time, their prize was Dean.

"So, what gave you the right to make a choice I should have made?" Alyssa's anger was far from seceding. "Why do you get to make a deal to have your brother back, but I don't?

"Alyssa, I had to. I promised my dad I would save him."

"So, bringing him back from the dead saved him? What if the only way to save him was to let him die, Dean?" She was itching to hit him again, just for being stupid, but she held herself as still as possible. "What if bringing him back set him on a more dangerous path than what he was on before?"

Dean hadn't thought about that. He could only see his brother's lifeless body laying on the bed, remembering their childhood, all the times he'd picked his brother up when he'd fallen, always being there to protect him, to keep him safe, like Dad told him to.

If he'd only gotten to Cold Oak sooner, just a few minutes sooner, his brother never would have been stabbed in the back. His brother never would have died. He'd have been there to protect him, if only he'd gotten there a few minutes earlier.

But that was all over now. Sam was here, and he was alive. That was all that mattered, until now.

"You're going to die, Dean. Who will be here to protect him then? Me? Bobby? Are we going to have to pick up where you leave off?"

"I don't know." Dean's shoulders fell, the weight of the decision and what he had done finally bearing down on him.

"You don't know." She stated to him. "You didn't plan this out very well, did you?"

"Well, it's not like I really had time! I wanted him back, Alyssa. He's my brother!"

"And my brother's ashes are spread across the Arkansas Mountains, Dean. I killed my own brother. Don't you think I might have considered doing the same thing?

"You don't know how many times I thought about making some kind of deal to get my brother back. But what would that have gotten me? I wanted to protect my brother, too, but I didn't see how selling my soul would have done that for him."

"Now Sam has to live with the knowledge you're going to die for him, leaving him alone in this world, just like me. You can't think with your heart in this job, Dean…" The rest of her piercing words never reached her lips. Her eyes grew wide, as she gasped for a breath, pressing her hand low against her stomach.

"Alyssa?" Dean reached for her shoulders, holding them tightly in case she was to fall. "You okay?"

She grabbed a hold of his arms to steady herself against the threatening dizziness. She slowly let out a deep breath, shivering as the feeling slowly subsided.

"It seems he's got an attitude of his own." She pointed to her belly. "If I get upset for too long, he lets me know I need to shut up."

"What does he do?" Dean let her shoulders go and placed a hand on her stomach, not sure of what to expect.

To his amazement, he felt a kick to the palm of his hand.

"That, only harder. Kind of feels like a whole soccer team in there."

The sound of another car engine distracted them from their discussion.

Dean could see Ellen behind the wheel of the same beat-up minivan he and Sam had to use a while back. He was almost surprised to see it still running.

Ellen got out of the minivan, hauling two grocery bags. Apparently, she had interrupted a very heated discussion, and she was curious to know it was all about. After all, one of the participants of the argument was a very pregnant young woman.

In her mind, she had already played out the quarrel she had come across. Dean finally screwed up and got a young woman knocked up. She had finally caught up to him and was probably demanding he be a daddy and give her money to take care of their child.

Figures, the Winchesters strike again, she thought, and now, this poor young woman will have to raise her child, the child of a reckless, uncaring immature man, by herself with no help from anyone.

"Ellen. Didn't know you were here." Dean greeted the older woman.

"Didn't know you were coming. Otherwise, I'd gotten a lot more food." Ellen hoisted the bags up a bit higher, showing him they were kind of heavy. "Mind getting the door?"

"Right." Dean hurried off to open the door for Ellen. Alyssa followed after her, eager to know who was the newest addition to the clan. "You okay?" Dean stopped her just before she went inside.

"I'm fine." Alyssa tore her eyes from Dean's and left him holding the door.


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter Three**

There was a strange woman in Alyssa's home, and she was feeling a little possessive. She tried to remain calm, detached; just like her hunter training had taught her.

Ellen greeted Sam as she made her way to the kitchen to unload the shopping bags.

"What are you doing here, Ellen?" Sam queried.

"She's staying here for now, until she finds her daughter." Bobby answered.

Dean and Sam both raised their eyebrows at their old friend.

"There's plenty of room here, and it's not like she has anywhere else to go. So can it, boys."

Both Winchesters straightened up and became serious once again.

Ellen returned to the main room catching sight of the pregnant woman once again.

She gestured to Alyssa with a nod of her head. "Is she one of your many conquests come back to bite you in the ass, Dean?"

"Ellen, this is Alyssa Singer, my daughter." Bobby jumped into the conversation before Dean could open his mouth and make things worse.

"You have a daughter?" Ellen extended her hand out to Alyssa, realizing her previous assumption may have been a bit premature.

Bobby finished with the introductions, "This is Ellen Harvelle. She's the owner of the Harvelle Roadhouse."

"Former owner of the former Roadhouse." She corrected him, waiting for Alyssa to engage in the handshake she offered.

They had just met, but Alyssa already knew this Ellen Harvelle was going to get on her nerves, and quickly.

But being the cordial person she was taught to be, Alyssa took Ellen's hand in hers, firm and strong. She wanted this woman to know she was not to be underestimated and she did not appreciate the assumption she was one of Dean's naïve one-night stands.

Ellen seemed to have gotten the message as she shook Alyssa's hand. Her demeanor changed from dismissing her to becoming wary of what the young woman had hidden within her.

During the short display of estrogen, a thought came to Alyssa. "You're not related to a Jo Harvelle, are you?"

"She's my daughter. You've seen her? Where is she? When did you see her? Is she okay?" The questions came out one right after the other.

"Whoa, take it easy. I haven't seen her in a few months, not since the job we did together in Florida. But she did give me her cell number. She was very excited about working with me again on any other cases I might have come up." Alyssa handed Ellen her cell phone, allowing her to make the call to her daughter.

Ellen thanked her, close to tears, and took the phone outside the house to make the very overdue call.

The tension in the room eased a bit as Ellen made her exit through the front door. A metaphysical sigh could be heard coming from all three men.

"What happened to your face, Dean?" Sam just noticed the reddening and swelling of the left side of Dean's face.

"Nothing." He wasn't about to admit to his brother he had his face nearly rearranged by a woman.

"You hit him, didn't you?" Bobby looked at Alyssa with the accusation clearly painted on his face.

"Maybe."

"I'll get some ice for that." Sam started for the kitchen.

"Forget it, Sam. I'm fine." Dean's pride was injured more than his face, and the ice could do nothing to soothe it.

Ellen rejoined the party in the house, Alyssa's cell phone in hand, and a smile on her face.

"Jo's okay. She knows about the Roadhouse. She says she'll be here in a few days. Thanks, Alyssa."

"You're welcome. I'm glad she's safe." She took her phone from Ellen and pocketed it.

"What job did you two work together?" Ellen asked of the very pregnant hunter.

"A boogeyman in Daytona. She's a quick learner, a bit too eager, but a very fast learner." Alyssa had to sit down. Her back was beginning to ache, as her doctor told her was normal this late in pregnancy.

"You're hunting while you're pregnant?" Ellen was astonished that a woman would jeopardize an unborn child by continuing to hunt the supernatural. Being a mother herself and having always put her daughter's needs before her own, Alyssa's blatant disregard for the safety of her unborn child hit a nerve in Ellen.

"Yeah," Alyssa answered her as if everyone did it. "What's your point?"

Bobby saw the flash of something dangerous cross Alyssa's face. "Alyssa's not your typical hunter, Ellen. Not by any means is she typical." He interjected so as to avoid the fight he could see coming if the conversation didn't turn another direction or ended.

"Well, I'd like to know more." Ellen sat down in a chair across from her.

Alyssa suddenly felt under the scrutiny of a den mother. This woman dared to look down her nose at her, trying to make her feel guilty for continuing to do what she did best because of her "condition".

She'd heard it before from other hunters she'd crossed paths with, including Jo. She was definitely her mother's daughter.

Sam intervened this time, letting Bobby off the hook as mediator, "Maybe later. We should really get to a motel and get some sleep. I'm sure Alyssa needs to get some rest. She's pretty wiped out from the drive." He did not want to see a cat fight tonight, and if Ellen didn't stop now, he'd be placing bets on Alyssa to come out the winner, hands down.

"Good idea. We'll see you tomorrow." Bobby walked the three younger hunters out the door. "I'll fill Ellen in on her. Thanks, Sam," he whispered.

"Sam will take your car, Alyssa." Dean volunteered his brother.

"Sorry, don't need a knight in shining armor to carry me off into the sunset. I can drive on my own. Been doing it this whole time, no need for a babysitter now. This time, you try to keep up." She got in the car and started it up, ending any chance of a rebuttal from either of them.

She was really drained from the drive, but there was only one more stop to make. She'd be enjoying a nice warm bath to ease her aching back in no time, and then would begin the work to get Dean out of his deal.

It was beginning to seem as though she was constantly trying to save her family from death. This time she hoped she could succeed.

Another one lost to the demon world would not sit well with her, and it could very well send her over the mental and emotional edge on which she was constantly teetering. Alyssa thought it best to concentrate on the road, letting the thoughts in her head disappear as she led the boys to their temporary accommodations.

Alyssa pulled the Camaro into the hotel parking lot waiting for the Impala to follow suit. She was tired of the seedy little hole-in-the-wall places they'd called home so many times in their lives, so she had chosen one of the more lavish accommodations this part of South Dakota offered.

She was more than able to afford nicer rooms in the nicer hotels since her family's money just kept building up, compounding interest, and keeping her well taken care of.

She'd liquidated some of the property assets, as she really didn't have a home anymore, and turned the responsibility of her money over to an accountant who owed her his life. And he knew not to screw up her funds for fear of her releasing the entity that had nearly killed him. So, she was extremely well off, and always would be.

Sam was in awe of the hotel they were going to be sleeping in tonight. No weird cowboy, disco, or pimp themed rooms this time. No more hard-as-rock mattresses infested with bacteria and insects.

He wondered how Alyssa could afford such expensive accommodations. He knew about her family's cabin in Arkansas, but he still didn't know the extent of her family's wealth. Whatever she had was better than the credit card fraud and constant hustling he and Dean had to do to get by on the road.

The rooms were immaculate with luxurious beds, comfortable seating, and huge bathrooms with Jacuzzi tubs. The carpets were plush and clean. The fabrics hanging from the windows were privacy sheers that let light in, but did not allow for outsiders to see into the rooms.

Sam set his bags on the king-sized bed, thinking he could get used to this life very quickly. He was already used to a life of normalcy and comfort, so this was nothing new to him. And he was really looking forward to the Jacuzzi bath.

Dean felt out of place, but he did his best to make do. He plopped himself down on his own king-sized bed, looking forward to a night of uninterrupted, blissful sleep.

"Hey, aren't you going next door with Alyssa?" Sam asked him, hoping to have the room to himself. Listening to his brother sawing logs all night tended to scratch his nerves a little too much lately.

"I thought you were still afraid of the dark. So, I figured I'd stick around and keep you safe." He rolled over turning his back to his brother.

In all honesty, Dean didn't want to leave his brother alone for a moment. He was still afraid this was all a dream, and he'd wake up to find himself standing before Sam's gravesite.

"I'm not afraid of the dark anymore, Dean. I think I can handle it now. What is your problem?" Sam sat on the end of the bed, looking at his older brother's back heaving with a sigh.

"I don't have a problem, Sam." He closed his eyes, wishing Sam would just shut up and go take his shower.

"Yes, you do. She's been gone for over six months. She's carrying your kid. And you're in this room instead of in hers. That's a problem, Dean."

Dean sat up and turned to his brother, "And just what am I supposed to do, huh? She already knows about the deal, what more is there to say?" This conversation needed to end before it became too complicated.

"Go and spend time with her, Dean. Talk to her about the baby. And with everything that's happened, I think you should finally tell her how you feel about her." Sam hadn't wanted to go in that direction, but it needed to be said, just in case they really were running out of time, and they didn't find a way out of the deal.

"What the hell does that mean?" Dean's eyes narrowed at his brother.

"You know what it means," Sam knew there was an argument brewing, but he wasn't stopping, not now. "I've heard you say her name in your sleep. I've even caught you looking at women who look like her, the hope in your eyes that if she'd turned around it would be her."

"No way. I never did that." he lied. It was a talent, telling half-truths and full-on bold-faced lies, and it was a talent Dean had studied well.

"Sure you didn't." He knew when his older brother was lying, no matter how hard he tried. "I saw you with her back in Arkansas. I saw the way you two looked at each other when the other wasn't looking. You admire her. You respect her. Damn, I'd bet you even love her on some level. And I know she feels the same for you."

"How do you know that?" He was desperately trying to find another direction for this conversation to go without getting his own feelings mixed into it. He didn't love Alyssa, he couldn't.

"She almost died to save me. Doesn't that tell you something? Not to mention how she has always looked at you, even when we first met her. She was hooked on you then."

"Well, I've always been this good looking." Dean tried to crack a joke, hoping to stop the conversation. He didn't want it to go any further, but it didn't seem Sam knew when to shut up.

"Dean, she loves you. I know she does." Sam got up off the bed; pointing to the adjoining room Alyssa had taken. "And you need to get over there and let her know how you feel. Before it's too late." He was done. He could think of nothing more to say to his big brother to heal the emotional wounds still festering inside him.

"What's the point, Sam? It's not like I've been faithful to her. I've been with other women since we split up in Arkansas. What do I say? Gee, honey, they didn't mean a thing to me." If he couldn't stop the talk, he was going to sabotage it.

"Dean, she knows you. Neither of you demanded a commitment, so I'm pretty sure she'll forgive you. She's carrying your son, and you haven't even asked her how she or the baby is doing." He had to get Dean out of his self-defeatist attitude if they were to have any chance of saving him from the deal.

"I felt the baby kick, Sam." He shifted gears, speaking low as if Alyssa could hear him in the other room.

"You did?" Sam sat back down on the bed with Dean, excited about this news. "What did it feel like?" Maybe this was the way to help him want to fight, the baby.

"Weird." Dean stared off into the distance remembering the sensation of what he'd felt against his hand, a slight smile sneaking across his face.

Sam could see his brother wanted to be a part of the new life he helped to create, but just as quickly, he sucked it all back and became untouchable once again. "Dean, she wouldn't turn you away if you walked in there and asked her to stay." C'mon, man. Just go to her, he thought to himself.

"I'm hungry." Dean found somewhere else to take the conversation: food. "I'll get her some food."

"Get cleaned up and take her downstairs to eat. Talk to her." He was pretty sure he had him convinced, but Dean could shift gears on a dime, like he'd apparently just did with their talk.

"Yeah, talk." He left the room, knowing if he didn't leave, Sam would keep on and on about Alyssa and the baby. He might even start in on him about the deal again.

Since Sam wouldn't shut up, Dean thought he'd have better luck with Alyssa, and she wouldn't want to talk at all, so he could get some sleep.

Sam watched his older brother leave the room and said a silent prayer for Alyssa to help him save Dean.


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter Four**

Alyssa had just finished emptying her leather bag, placing her clothes in the deep drawers of the dark wood dresser when there was a light knock on her room door. She peeked through the peephole to see Dean standing on the other side.

"Hey," she opened the door to find him holding the side of his face where she'd hit him. "Are you okay?"

"Still a little sore, but I'm okay."

She stepped back and let him enter the room, trying desperately to keep control of the desire to just take him and make him hers all over again. This is not the time or place for that right now, she told herself.

"You need some ice for that?"

"No, it's not as bad as earlier. Just a headache now."

"Or maybe your brain hurts from lack of use." She waited for him to sit down on the bed, grimacing when he instead lay down as if to stay a while. Her gut twisted and her skin warmed remembering what he felt like next to her, skin to skin. She shook her head a bit to clear the thoughts. "I wanted to apologize for hitting you."

Dean couldn't find a comeback to her snide remark, so he let it go, for now. "I deserved it. Been waiting for someone to do it. Just wish it hadn't been you. You hit pretty hard for a girl." He rubbed his chin.

"Want me to do it again? I think you're missing an important element of comparison. You might need a second opinion?" She pulled her arm back as if to give him another well placed right hook across his face.

Dean put his hands in the air as if to surrender. "No. I'm good. You hit hard. Okay? Better?"

"Much better."

He could still smell her shampoo, the same shampoo she'd used for years. It filled him with the feeling of something familiar, something comforting, almost like home.

"Uh, there's a…I'm kind of…would you like to…" he stumbled over the words he had in his head, not knowing exactly what to say to her.

"Just spit it out, Dean." She sat on the bed next to him, her back aching terribly from the long car ride and the pressure of the baby moving around.

"You hungry?" Two words, that's it? He chided himself.

"Yeah," she chuckled at his attempt to ask her to dinner. "How about we order in though? I'm not much in the mood to sit down for a long time to eat a meal."

"You okay?" Dean sat up on the bed, throwing his legs over the edge, feeling the light throbbing in his head from the abrupt movement.

"I'm fine." She didn't want his sympathy or even his empathy. She wasn't sure what she wanted at the moment. "Just tired. It was a long drive home." She got up from the bed heading to the bathroom. "Hey, you order food while I go take a bath to help this loosen up."

Dean listened as she started the bath water, remembering the last time he'd sat in a tub with her.

She'd been feverish with some kind of infection or demonic touch, or whatever it was. He'd had to lay with her in the bath to help break her fever. His heart had nearly plummeted into his stomach at the thought of losing her back then. He shook off the thoughts, concentrating on getting food.

Dean found the menu in the bedside table drawer. "What do you want to eat?"

Alyssa poked her head out of the door, obviously hiding the fact she wasn't wearing much more than a towel. "Burgers and fries are fine with me."

He picked up the phone and ordered two orders of burgers and fries with apple pie and ice cream for dessert and a beer and a soda.

With the food on the way, Dean wasn't sure of what to do next. He remained on the bed, staring at the bathroom door.

Sam had said for him to tell her how he felt about her. But what could he say? He didn't even know how he felt about her.

Dean thought back to the first time he'd seen her: the night in the house with the werewolf holding her captive.

As her life seemed to be spinning out of control around her, she'd had the strength to fight for her own life. From that moment, Dean had nothing but respect for the girl who took on a fight even when she knew there was the possibility she would lose.

Four years later, they'd met up again at Bobby's. It was her eighteenth birthday, and Dean finally took notice of her as more than just a kid. She'd grown into a beautiful woman and a lethal hunter.

She was his match in the use of weapons and in hand-to-hand combat, but she had surpassed him in wits and wisdom. It should have bothered him how much smarter she was than him, but she never let it come between them as friends.

They had decided to do a hunt together, not telling his dad or Bobby, for fear they would refuse to let them go. Instead, it was agreed, they'd tell the parents they were going camping for target practice and outdoor survival training.

It seemed to have worked with his dad, but Bobby had eyed him suspiciously before they'd left.

The hunt they'd found was for a banshee. In a small town about six hours from Bobby's junkyard, there were several missing persons reported. All of them had something in common; they were all men, and at every crime scene there had been a comb left behind.

Some legends of the banshee say she will leave a comb on the ground to lure unsuspecting humans to her and spirit them away never to be seen again. The fact the victims were all men gave Alyssa somewhere to start on the investigation.

She'd discovered the banshee was the result of a domestic dispute turned fatal. The husband had beaten and murdered his wife in a fit of uncontrolled rage. Apparently the young woman's body had never been found her murder never solved. Her spirit then stayed on this plane, seeking to avenge her own death by killing men she could capture.

Alyssa had concocted a plan to lure her to them, hopefully keeping them both safe enough to rid the world of the banshee. To set the trap, he'd had to attack Alyssa. They had to pretend to be fighting, but make it as real as possible. Once the spirit was trapped, Alyssa was to perform Last Rites, has her body hadn't been given a proper Catholic burial.

At just the right moment, the play began. They'd started an argument about something, but he couldn't remember exactly what it had been about. She had said something about his father, pissing him off to the point that he forgot about the original plan, and he had hit her full force. As she fell back, screaming and crying, the perfect actress, he remembered where he was and what he had done. He wanted to apologize, reach for her, and make sure she was okay, but she kept the scene moving along.

Alyssa, in turn, attacked him, but not as though she were a hunter fully capable of incapacitating him with a well placed roundhouse kick. Instead, she attacked him like a girl, slapping at him, crying, screaming for him to love her or she was leaving.

Even though they were in the world of pretend, he had to grab her to keep her nails from scratching him, and doing some kind of damage to his face. Grabbing both of her wrists in his left hand, he twisted her around into his chest and gripped around her waist with his right arm, tightening so she couldn't escape.

Making sure the aggression was as real as possible, Dean had to rough her up some, threatening to take from her what he wanted since she hadn't given it up lately. He'd had her on the ground, his hand around her throat, and started to remove her clothes.

He had hesitated for just a moment, realizing the fear in her eyes could be genuine. To ease his doubts, she winked at him, and then fell right back into character, screaming at him to stop.

Just as he had pulled the knife from the sheath tucked into the back of his pants, the banshee appeared.

Dean had spun around, releasing Alyssa from his grasp, allowing her to escape around the other side of the banshee.

They had laid out a circle of salt right where they were hoping the spirit would show up, and it was Dean's job to get her into the circle if she wasn't close enough to it, so Alyssa could trap it by closing the salt line behind it.

The banshee wanted him, needed him to die to satisfy its hunger for revenge. He used her desire to kill him to move her into position within the circle.

Everything was working well up to the point when Alyssa had completed the circle of salt. The banshee began to wail, her anger and need for vengeance evident in her screams as she realized she was trapped.

Things went from bad to downright frightening.

The banshee realized what was happening, understanding she was going to be given her Last Rites, and thus be returned to the spirit world. She wasn't going without a fight, nor would she just let the two people who dared to stop her survive. The winds whipped around them, sending their tools scattering through the woods surrounding them, and slowly thinning the salt line they'd poured around her.

Dean could see the salt line being blown away, knowing they're time was short. The papers with the words to the Last Rite were all over the place and no longer in order. They were going to lose this one, and one of them could pay the ultimate price for their mistake. He'd looked to Alyssa for suggestions, but she seemed to be in a world all her own. Alyssa stared at the specter before them and stepped across the salt line, shouting words in a language Dean had never heard before. He knew Latin, he knew some Spanish, but he couldn't place the language she somehow knew by heart.

It seemed as though time had stopped at that one moment. He could Alyssa in the circle, her long brown hair flowing around her as if she were floating in water, her eyes darkened, focused only on the thing hovering in the air just a little higher than she stood. The banshee's mouth was open screaming and wailing, but no sound was coming out, her white hair flowed around her like Alyssa's, her eyes were as pale as twin moons.

Dean had no time to cover his eyes before the flash of light consumed him, blinding him briefly and then it was over. The night once again consumed everything, putting itself were it belonged.

Dean blinked, trying to regain his vision, and stumbled around the campsite hoping to find Alyssa, but she was gone. He panicked, knowing he couldn't return without her, and not wanting to lose her.

Where had she gone? What happened to her? Did the banshee take her as her last victim?

A low moan from a few feet back from the circle, hidden by the shadows of the night, cut through his fear.

He'd called to her and heard her answer him. She was fine, and it was over. Alyssa had won, taking the comb on the ground as her prize.

That night they'd celebrated their victory, sharing each other's thoughts, feelings, and fears. The moments of reflection became moments of sharing more than just words.

He had become her first love, and has he had learned later on, her last for many years.

Reflecting on their past together, and what they've shared, Dean realized he did feel something for her. It was more than what he had felt for Cassie, much more.

But was it love? He couldn't be sure, for he didn't know what love really felt like. He had no experiences with which to compare what he felt for Alyssa.

When they had split up in Arkansas, it nearly crushed him. He hid it well as the days turned into weeks and the weeks turned into months. He tried with all his might to get her off his mind, putting all his energy into hunting down the demon and distracting himself with other willing women.

The guilt of those excursions crept into his heart. Would she forgive his indiscretions or hold it against him for all time, what little time he had left?

The deal again invaded his thoughts. She deserved better, better than him, better than what he could offer her. His son deserved a father that would be there, someone who would pitch a ball to him, teach him to ride a bicycle, be there when he learned to drive a car, and who would be there to see him become a man.

Dean suddenly realized he hated his father for what he'd been through in his life. Dad had trained him and Sam to be soldiers, passing on his obsessive mission to kill the demon that had murdered their mother.

Dean's job was always to protect Sam, never let anything happen to Sammy. In all the years he'd been there for his brother, not once did Dad ever say he'd done a good job, until the day he died. Only then did he say he was proud of him. Only then did he admit he was an ass for what he'd done to his children.

But even then, with his heart on his sleeve, the confession in the air, the orders didn't stop. His last words to Dean were to save Sam, again, protect him, and if he couldn't, he had orders to kill his own brother.

The seething hatred towards his father grew in Dean's soul; his hero was no longer worthy of his admiration. The true heroes were Sam and Bobby, and now Alyssa. They deserved his respect for they didn't put everything else over family. They were the people he knew would be there for him whenever he needed it. They were his true family, and Dad was nothing to him now.

Making up his mind to do what he could to bridge the gap between himself and Alyssa, Dean slowly made his way to the bathroom door and knocked as quietly as he could, not sure if he wanted to be heard.

"Come in, Dean." Came the voice from the other side.

She'd been wondering how long he was going to stay out there. She knew he couldn't pass up the chance to be around a naked woman, but she wasn't exactly the same as she was that last time they were together.

Her own thoughts had bothered her: would he want to see her again? Would he see her the same? Or would he think she was just too fat to be around?

Realistically, she knew being pregnant wasn't something to be ashamed of, especially as she had witnessed the miracle of her body changing as the baby grew. And she wasn't the kind of woman who cared what other people think. If she had cared, she wouldn't have become a hunter at all.

But Dean was different. He was important to her. It bothered her to think he might not be attracted to her any longer. It scared her to think he might even be angry with her for being pregnant.

She shoved her fears and thoughts aside, as she waited for him to enter the room.

He opened the door to the bathroom and took in the décor.

The walls were painted in off-whites and pale beiges, as if dabbed with sponges to give it a more haphazard feel. The vanity was huge, sporting two sinks and plenty of counter space. The Jacuzzi tub was set in the corner of the bathroom, surrounded by a privacy curtain, if it was needed, with a shower stall behind it.

"Just checking on you to make sure you're okay. You've been in here a while." Dean kept his eyes on other things around the bathroom, not sure if deserved the right to look at her naked form.

"I'm fine, and you're welcome to join me, if you like. These water jets are awesome." She leaned back in the tub, feeling her back muscles slowly releasing the tension, easing the pain in her lower body.

"Who's going to answer the door for the food?" Dean finally summed up the courage to look in her in the eye. He couldn't see much else of her past the bubbling water as the jets did their job.

She pointed to the wall next to her head. There was an intercom system that would allow her to not only answer the door but would also let her unlock the door so the busboy could deliver the food.

"You sure it's okay for…" Dean pointed at himself then the tub, indicating him joining her in the bath.

"Dean, just get in. It's not like we haven't seen each other naked before." She could see him blush a little, but just a little.

He stripped off his clothes and lowered himself into the warm roiling bath. His muscles were shouting their praise for this wonderful reprieve.

She smiled seeing him falling in love with the Jacuzzi jets that pumped the water against his back and thighs. Seeing him in the buff set things in motion inside her she wanted, no needed, to satisfy. She had thought of him often, the feel of his lips against hers, the way his body fit hers so well, their sweat mixing…she had to stop herself for fear of losing herself in another one of her memories.

The moment was awkward, both of them in the tub together, but on opposite sides, each of them afraid to be near or touch the other. Hesitation and apprehension swarmed their minds as each tried to size up the other as if they were enemies.

The father of her child was right there in front of her, but she just couldn't bring herself to approach him.

She asked herself questions, expecting the answers to come to her as they once did, through the voice in her mind: the voice that had been her friend for so many years, the voice she learned later was a connection to her mother's spirit.

Should she make the first move? Would he be receptive to her advances or would he reject her?

But no answers came to her. The voice was silent. Her mother's spirit was no longer with her, having sacrificed herself to protect her daughter. Alyssa sat in the water, suddenly feeling very alone.

The swelling on the side of his face seemed to be worsening. She felt guilty for hitting him as hard as she did.

She slowly scooted around in the tub, careful to keep the water level safely above her bare breasts. Her hair was long enough to cover her, but it didn't do much good when it was wet and floating around her.

As she raised her hand to his face, Dean moved back a bit, as if she was going to strike him.

"Hold still. I'm not going to hit you," she spoke softly.

"Hope not." Dean remained motionless, holding his breath, his heart speeding up as her fingers drew closer.

Her fingers gingerly touched the side of his face, feeling for anything that might be out of the ordinary, like a fracture or maybe a broken jaw. He could talk, which was sometimes a good thing, and it didn't seem as if anything were broken.

Her eyes scanned his face, catching sight of the scar on his forehead. She remembered their battle in the church that wasn't a church. Yellow Eyes had almost won that one. But this wound was fresher, more recent.

She recognized Bobby's handy work with stitching wounds, and knew the scar would be minimal at best. She'd had personal experience with his doctoring ability and her scars were hardly noticeable.

He could smell the scent of her hair, the shampoo she'd used ever since he'd known her. He knew the scent. It was something flowery, something ancient. Then it struck him: jasmine.

Alyssa remained as still as she could, afraid to move away, even more frightened to move any closer to him.

Where her hand had touched him, he once again could feel the warmth spreading across him, reaching into the inner core of his soul, and erasing his fears, easing his concerns, and removing all doubt from his mind.

He wanted more than anything, well almost more than anything, to talk to her about how she did it to him: how she just made him feel as if there was nothing wrong in the world. But he was pretty sure he wouldn't get an answer from her, as he believed she didn't know she was doing it, let alone how she was doing it.

With her so close to him, he could see her eyes staring directly into his. There were gold flecks sprinkled within the brown of her irises. He never really took notice of it before now, and it lent even more to the hypnotic nature of her eyes, the way the gold sparkled.

The heat in his gaze settled into her. All she had to do was move a bit closer to him, and she would once again feel his lips against hers, feel his passion igniting her own.

He could see the pulse in her neck as the blood raced through her veins. Her breathing had quickened, keeping pace with his.

A shiver went through her as she thought about what one more movement could lead to with him.

She couldn't take it anymore. She had to know if he would turn away from her, or if he would let her feel him against her one more time.

Alyssa leaned closer to him, wanting so much to have him, touch him, and feel him.

Dean held his breath as she made the first move, questioning why his own muscles refused to obey his commands to take her in his arms.

The smoldering embers between them ignited, their lips but a breath away from each other, the time was now, or never.


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter Five **

The buzzer on the intercom blared through the bathroom, echoing off the walls, announcing the room service orders had arrived.

Saved by the bell, she thought to herself.

Alyssa backed up to the opposite side of the tub and hit the intercom button, opening the room door for the food delivery.

"Guess I'll go take care of the tip." Alyssa made her way to the edge of the tub. She'd been right there for him, but he hadn't even moved an inch to bridge the physical gap. I guess it really is over, she thought has her heart broke. "You coming out?"

Dean didn't dare move. Though his body wouldn't move on his command to ravage her lips, it did however give its own response to her being so close to him. Getting out of the tub at that very moment would have been very awkward.

"Not yet. Muscles still tight." Dean grunted and turned away, giving her privacy to exit the tub without him seeing her.

"Better be quick. Burgers will be cold soon." Alyssa wrapped her dark blue silk robe around her, tying it off; a single tear escaped the rock solid barrier around her emotions as she closed the bathroom door.

Sam was alone in the room, unpacking his clothes and sorting them into piles of what was clean and what was dirty. Alyssa had gotten the rooms for a whole week, so he was going to get comfortable.

Dean hadn't come back, so he hoped things had worked out with her. He smiled, thinking of his brother finally finding someone who could handle him and the job.

His thoughts went to Sarah, and he realized he missed her terribly. Their time together had been brief and wrought with danger. He wondered if he should call her, and if she would want to hear from him at all.

What was it on the east coast? Ten o'clock? Maybe it was too late. Maybe she was already asleep, but for some reason he couldn't stop himself from wanting to hear her voice.

He grabbed his phone and hit the send button on Sarah's name. The phone rang four times. He was just about to hang up when he heard a sleepy, groggy voice answer.

"Hello?" she mumbled. Who the hell was calling this late at night?

"Sarah, it's Sam. Did I wake you?" he felt ashamed. He should have waited until morning.

"Sam? No, I just dozed off on the couch watching an old movie. How are you? Where are you?" she had pretty much accepted she was out of Sam's life. After all he hadn't called or anything since they'd parted what seemed like forever ago.

"Easy, one question at a time, okay," he chuckled. "I've been busy."

"More ghost hunting?" Sarah had had the one experience dealing with the after-life and knew there was more to that world. She had been doing some studying on her own since the evil painting fiasco. Her father had not been pleased with her growing interest in urban legends, mythology, and the dead.

"Yeah." He didn't know if he should share everything he and Dean had been through right off the bat, so he tried to keep the conversation from getting too deep into his and his brother's recent cases.

For the next two hours, Sam and Sarah talked about what they'd been doing and the places Sam had traveled. He kept a lot of the details to himself, not wanting to scare her, but more for himself, as he really didn't like reliving he and Dean's narrow misses with death.

"Um, would you be interested in a vacation? I'd like to see you again. We didn't really have a lot of time to spend together before." He crossed his fingers, secretly making a wish she would say yes.

"You know, I do have a few weeks of vacation saved up. Where do you want to meet?" She was so excited to see him again. What should she pack? Something warm, itsy bitsy, and revealing?

"Well, I'm in South Dakota right now. Not sure of where we'll go next, but you're welcome to come along. I could sure use the company."

"Sure. A road trip, huh? Guess I'll pack warm. Can't wait to see you again. I'll catch the first flight in the morning, okay?" She hung up the phone with butterflies in her stomach. She felt like a teenager again talking to her first crush.

Sam hung up the phone with a smile on his face. She had been the first woman he'd met who didn't run away from a fight with a ghost. She had stood with him taking on the unknown like a real champ.

They had briefly talked about losing loved ones. Her logical thinking that those who pass before us don't want us to wallow in grief and sorrow until we stop living made sense to him. He knew Jess would want him to be happy. So would his mother and father. And if Sarah made him happy, then that's what he wanted for himself.

Sam jumped in the shower with a more vibrant and positive outlook on the near future. He buried the thoughts of his brother's time limit deep for now. Things would be good for a while, and he didn't want anything to screw it up.

Dean finally made his way from the bathroom to join Alyssa in the main area of the hotel room. He found her at the table near the window, the food spread out before her. She was picking at her fries and hadn't touched her burger.

"Not hungry?" He sat down across from her and started eating his own French fries.

"Starving," she replied. "But I thought it would be rude of me to start eating before you were finished in there." She put a fry in her mouth, chewing it slowly. "How's your head?"

"Better. Thanks," he mumbled through the food in his mouth.

They ate in silence, concentrating on their meals, unsure of what to say to each other.

Alyssa felt defeated. She'd hoped with all her heart that Dean would have taken her in his arms and never let her go. She would have been satisfied with him reacting with some semblance of happiness at her arrival. If he'd smiled when he'd seen her at Bobby's, it would have been just as good. But none of those scenarios had played out, and she was pretty sure she knew why.

Dean occasionally glanced at her while they ate; realizing something about himself was different. He thought it might have to do with the deal, but he suddenly knew it had everything to do with the woman sitting across from him.

Their departure in Arkansas had left a hole in him, a gaping wound that just didn't seem to heal. He had tried for months to fill the void in his soul, but he always felt as if he was incomplete. Sitting here with her now, he found the emptiness had been filled. She was the reason he felt whole once again.

Dean didn't want to go in that direction right now, as he didn't understand what it meant to him, and she wasn't the one he wanted to talk to about it, so he opted to talk about work.

"A Boogeyman, huh?" Dean spoke through his meal.

"Yeah, a Boogeyman." Alyssa polished off her burger and reached for the apple pie.

"Pretty hard to pin those down. How'd you finally get it?" He took a swig of his beer to wash down the last bite of his burger. He wasn't much for apple pie these days as it reminded him of an orchard and a scarecrow he'd rather forget. Instead, he reached for a bowl of the vanilla ice cream.

"I teamed up with Jo on it, after convincing her it was a two-man job. She took a job with a family as a baby-sitter." Alyssa scooped a big chunk of apple pie into her mouth. Remembering the job and what it cost making her lose some of her appetite, but she needed to eat for the baby.

"What happened?" Dean watched as she dug into the pie, seeing her eyes focus out as she revisited the hunt.

"Jo called me to report one of the kids said she was scared of the "something" in her closet. We had a hunch there was going to be an attack, so I camped in with the kids and Jo, and we waited." Alyssa stabbed her fork in the remains of her pie, her desire to eat completely gone now.

"And?" He almost forgot to breathe as he anticipated the end of the story.

"It showed up, as we hoped. I got it out of the closet, and Jo froze on me."

"What do you mean 'froze'?" Dean stopped eating the ice cream, the spoon held midway between the bowl and his mouth.

"Like deer in the headlights froze." Alyssa slid the left shoulder of her robe down her back, making sure to discreetly keep the rest of herself covered. "It's how I got these." She leaned a little to the right to show him her new battle scars.

Dean dropped his spoon in the bowl and walked around to her side of the table. "Damn."

The four thin scars were at least six-inches long running from the bottom of her shoulder blade to midway through her ribs. He ran his fingers lightly from the top to the bottom of the scars, each finger matching the line of each scar.

Alyssa shuddered; waves of goose bumps crossed her skin as his fingers slid down her back, tracing the lines.

"Do they still hurt?" He didn't think they did. The scars didn't look fresh enough to still be painful. He dropped his hand away from her, letting the water rush over his nerves, traveling his body, settling low within him.

"No," she whispered, as she moved the robe back into place. The ache in her heart grew, the loneliness threatened to consume her. She didn't understand how he could affect her to the point of breaking through her well-preserved emotional walls. Feeling weak and vulnerable was not something Alyssa accepted lightly about herself.

She struggled to regain control of her hormones, while her mind assaulted her with questions. What was so wrong with her that he wouldn't want to kiss her, wouldn't want to touch her, or even smile at her? Was she that horrendously huge that he couldn't stand to look at her?

She couldn't take it anymore. She was a hunter, a person who sought the truth and dealt with it, no matter the cost. Being with him, here, now, the greatest cost would be her heart, but she had to know the answers to the questions that filled her mind.

"Why did you come to my room?" She stood up, facing Dean, staring him straight in his eyes.

"What?" He wasn't sure what to make of the sudden shift in the conversation, and he'd been taken aback by her challenging posture.

"Why did you come to my room, Dean?" She repeated, her voice low and carrying a warning.

"I...uh..." he didn't have a response ready.

"Did you want to come here?"

"Uh...Sam..." was all he could get out.

"Sam told you to come over here, didn't he?" she sighed. Dean never would have come to her if Sam hadn't pushed him her way. It was time everything was laid on the table, no more secrets. The truth had to come out now, for they were both running out of time.

"He said I should...uh..." Dean stepped back, feeling cornered and at the mercy of the fury he could feel brewing.

"Sam sent you here because you wouldn't come of your own free will. Right?"

Dean was positive if she'd still had the powers she absorbed from the other "psychic children", the room would probably in flames right now and he'd be a crispy critter. Without that power, the next dangerous thing with her was her temper and ability to fight. So to save his own skin, he tried another tactic by throwing his brother under the bus.

"Sam wouldn't shut up. He kept talking about getting to know you again, finding out how you and the baby are doing, and something about how you feel about me."

Alyssa stopped for a moment. If Sam knew her unrequited love for Dean, then what did Dean know?

Dean waited for the sparks to fly, but with each passing second he was beginning to think he'd won this round. "What? No snappy comeback?"

"No. No snappy comeback. Just a question." She softened her face, her eyes, and relaxed herself. If the purging of her soul were to begin, it would have to be without anger or resentment. "What did Sam tell you?"

"He said you might…" the word just wouldn't come without great effort, "…love…me."

"It's a four letter word, Dean. Not that hard to say." She crossed her arms, resting them on her belly.

"Snappy comeback." Talking about feelings was making him extremely uncomfortable, making him want to pace, twitch, or maybe even run. But he knew if he went to his room, he'd have to face Sam and his relentless self-help-yoga-crap, so sticking it out here, with someone a lot like him, might be easier. Or so he hoped.

"And what do you think, Dean?" She kept the questions short and simple, so as not to confuse or scare him out of the conversation. Her turn would come, and then she would have a few choice words for Dean Winchester. He'd better break out the dictionary, she thought.

"I think he's nuts. I mean, yeah, we shared some times. Good times. Really good times," he grinned remembering just how good the times were, but seeing she wasn't amused, he changed gears. "I don't know."

And he was actually telling the truth. There was a sense of pride in himself for saying what really was on his mind. He didn't know what Alyssa felt for him, but he did know what he felt, or he kind of knew.

"You don't know." She walked to the window, staring out at the world before them: cars, people, buildings, birds, and clouds. All of it seemed so innocent, so pure, and so ignorant. And right now, she would pay with her life for just a moment of that blissful ignorance. "Maybe he's right."

"Wait. Are you saying you fell in love with me?" Dean wasn't really surprised, as he suspected as much, but what did catch him off guard was how his own heart responded. He seemed almost thrilled, joyful, and dare he say, happy, to hear her finally admit to something.

"Would that be a bad thing?" She turned to him, her arms still crossed.

Dean saw her in a new light, literally. The sunlight from the window haloed around her, almost as if it was coming from her, a complete glow around her. Her long brown hair lay across her shoulders, her brown eyes glittered with the gold flecks he'd seen in them earlier, and her skin he knew felt like silk. Everything in him was driving him to take her in his arms, kiss her, and make her his once more. But reality has a way of slamming the door on any chance of happiness.

"With our track records, you think it's a good idea to fall for someone? Anyone?" Dean had to turn away from her to keep himself under control. She was beautiful, in more ways than one, but he was a dead man. See, reality does bite.

"Are you referring to my record or yours? Or are you referring to your deal?" Alyssa caught the moment. She saw it. It was nothing more than split second, but it was there. The green in his eyes had darkened, if only for a brief time, but it was still something she could work with, something to keep him from the pits of hell.

"All of it. I mean…c'mon…really?" He was at a loss for words. How do you respond to hearing the woman you respected and admired, the same woman who disappeared for over ten years, the woman who now carried your child, has fallen in love with you? And when did it all happen? Ten years ago? Six months ago? An hour ago? "You really feel that way?"

"Yes, Dean, I do have feelings for you. After all, I'm carrying your child. But it could just be gas." She let the words sink into his thick skull before she started again.

"Funny."

"Thank you. What if I do love you? What would that change between us?" It was time to break out the big words and heavy concepts. She hoped he was ready for this.

"I don't know. I guess…" he thought for a second. Be honest with her, he told himself. "I guess it would make it harder to hunt with you. I mean other than the obvious," he gestured towards her stomach, "and it would be pointless. You'd be better off finding someone else who will be here long enough to return the feelings."

"So, you think that because of you're deal, it would be a waste of my time to love you. That's of course, if I did." She slowly moved towards him, her eyes targeting his. "You believe you aren't worth the time and effort to know and love. You've always thought that about yourself, Dean. That's why you're so comfortable with bedding so many women in so little time. The hit-and-run's are easier to break away from than the head-on crashes." She stopped just in front of him; close enough to feel his breath on her forehead.

The scent of her wafted its way into his nostrils, into his blood, and seemed to find his central nervous system. He became paralyzed, not only unable to move, but not wanting to move.

She placed her hand against the side of his face, cradling him as he leaned into her palm.

Once again, as if he was addicted to a drug, he needed to feel the sensation of warm water rushing over his skin, and he was not disappointed. The warmth spread through him, and as it always did, it eased his fears, erased his doubts, and filled the emptiness he'd come to accept was a part of him the last six months.

"No matter what you think of yourself, Dean Winchester, there are some people who think you're worth saving. And I'm one of them."

She bridged the gap between them, physically and emotionally. Her lips touched his, waiting for him to return the kiss, and he took no time in doing so. He took her mouth gently as first, and gradually, the kiss became hungry and demanding.

It was as if time had never passed, and they had never parted. Each knew what the other needed and wanted without one word having been spoken. The afternoon became evening as they fell asleep in each other's arms, exhausted, satisfied, and with the mutual understanding that something special had occurred between them, but it didn't require an explanation.

Dean listened to her breathing, feeling her chest rise and fall against his ribs, as she slept against him, her head cradled on his shoulders, his right arm holding her to him. He wasn't going to admit it to anyone, not even Sam, but it was possible he did feel something for Alyssa, and she for him. Of course, she hadn't actually confessed anything, but what she left out of the conversation and her actions pretty much solidified it for him.

She would be the one person in this world, besides Sam, whom he could trust, not only with his heart, but also with his life. He accepted that he was going to die, but he did it for Sam, and even though he knew he was going to hell, he could tell his last year on this earth would be something to remember.


	6. Chapter 6

**Chapter Six**

Perhaps it was the silence of the night or the humdrum of the television, but whatever it was, it woke Dean up out of a dead sleep. The only light in the room came from the television he'd left on after Alyssa had gone to sleep.

He looked to his left, expecting to see her laid out next to him in the bed, but she wasn't there. He rose off the pillows looking around hoping to see her sitting in the chair or standing at the window. The light in the bathroom was off, so she hadn't needed to make a late night trip there.

Where the hell could she be? He dressed hurriedly knowing that every moment counted when someone was missing. He was about to knock on Sam's door, when he heard laughing. He recognized Sam's voice right off, so would that make Alyssa the other voice? What would she be doing in his room in the middle of the night? Better not be back at square one again.

He knocked on the door, hoping he was wrong.

He heard his brother's voice call "Come in, Dean" from the other side. He slowly opened the door, not sure of what to expect.

Alyssa and Sam were sitting at the table, mulling through several grocery bags. She was holding a pint of ice cream and was licking the spoon. Sam was helping himself to a pint of his own, strawberry from the looks of it.

"Hi, hope we didn't wake you," Alyssa was dressed in sweatpants and a tank top.

"Sorry, Dean. She had a midnight craving and didn't want to wake you. I heard her trying to leave, so I offered to take her to the store," he reached into a bag and pulled out a pint of chocolate ice cream. "Want one?" This seemed to be funny, as they both erupted into a hearty session of laughter.

With a sense of relief that there was no repeat of the nightmare of the past, Dean sat down in one of the four chairs at the table, placing himself between the two of them. He took the offered ice cream and a spoon. It was only a few hours until sunrise, so they enjoyed their early breakfast of ice cream as they waited for the start of a new day.

While they indulged in Alyssa's craving, their conversation turned to their recent hunts. Sam was bragging about the trickster they'd come across. Dean had to one-up him with the zombie and ghost child.

Alyssa listened to Sam recount some of their adventures, and she inwardly celebrated the demise of old Yellow Eyes.

"So, about the Boogeyman." Dean interrupted through a spoonful of chocolate ice cream.

"Boogeyman? You faced a Boogeyman?" Sam's eyes were round and wide with shock.

"Yeah. Don't look so surprised, Sam. I'm perfectly capable of doing the job."

"Never said you couldn't. I just thought a Boogeyman was extremely hard to catch up to, let alone kill." He was complimenting her skills as a hunter, not criticizing her for doing it while pregnant.

"He was a bitch to kill, and he damned near got me."

"And that's my point?" Dean scooped another spoonful of ice cream into his mouth. "What happened to give you those new scars?"

"I told you, she froze. She just didn't move when that thing came out of the closet. I grabbed the kids and pretty much tossed them towards the bedroom door as he grabbed my foot," the shivers traveled up and down her body as she recalled that night.

Dean sat silent waiting for the rest of the story. Sam, too, stopped eating his early morning treat wanting to hear more.

"He was pulling me into the closet. I was screaming for Jo to grab my hands and help me, but she just stood there. She finally woke up out of whatever daydream she'd been in and grabbed my arms, pulling me out. I felt his nails," she had to pause a moment, still feeling the grip the thing had had on her, "dig into my back. I reached around and grabbed his arm, pulling him with us. Jo finally got up her nerve and killed it after I got him out of the closet." She tried to go back to eating her ice cream but suddenly seemed to have lost her appetite for it.

Their eyes were on her, staring at her. She shifted uncomfortably in the chair, trying to shake off the feeling of their gazes.

"If you hunt again, it's with us, no one else." Dean made it sound as if it was a final decision needing no discussion.

"Excuse me?" Now he decides to go all white knight on me? She thought.

"Dean, we have other things to worry about. We can't take her with us this time." Sam was sure Alyssa would agree. They needed to find a way for Dean to beat the crossroads deal and having Alyssa tag along could put her and the baby in danger.

"I get it, Sam. But I don't want her hunting alone anymore." He thought he was being chivalrous about wanting to protect what was his. However, it seemed the other two people weren't quite seeing it his way.

"I don't need a baby-sitter, Dean. I can hunt just fine on my own. It's not my fault Jo freaked out, but that's over. I'm not working with her again. Trust me." Alyssa fought for what remained of her independence.

Just because they'd shared something earlier didn't give him the right to order her around like she was some foot soldier in the presence of a General, she kept repeating to herself.

"Well that's obvious. But you're still sticking with us. And that's final." Dean expected her to disagree, just like he would have if the tables had been turned, and because she was just like him, he was being even more persistent in his expectations. She was the kind of person to get herself into trouble, and with the baby still safely tucked in her womb, he didn't want her to get into trouble without him around to get her out of it.

Alyssa stabbed her spoon through the bottom of the ice cream pint. She stood up slowly, pulling herself up straight and tall. Her voice was harsh and cutting. "You are not my father, my husband, or even my boyfriend, Dean. I can take care of myself, by myself." And with that, she stormed into her room, slamming the door behind her.

"Does that make it strike two or three?" Sam cocked his head a bit to the side, thinking of the other times Dean had screwed up with Alyssa.

"Shut up, Sam." Dean sat in the chair staring at the door she'd just walked through.

She was right. He wasn't her boyfriend or husband, just the guy whose kid she was carrying. He was the sperm donor for a child that shouldn't have been. By all accounts, he was the father of a miracle.

Even thinking those words stung him just as much as her saying them. But this wasn't just about her now. The closer they got to each other, the more protective he became. Letting her go in Arkansas was necessary to protect her from Yellow Eyes, but he was dead and gone now. In his place on this earth were hundreds of other demons looking to take out any and all hunters, and most of them were gunning for Sam. He wouldn't be a responsible older brother to Sam, or whatever he was to Alyssa, to just allow them to end up getting hurt if he could help.

"Do you want me to go in there and talk to her for you?" Sam offered.

"No, I got it this time. It's not about her being alone anymore, Sam." He was practicing his argument with his brother, hoping it sounded convincing enough for her.

"I know, Dean. Go tell her," he nodded toward the door.

"Right. Shields up." Dean said in his best Captain Kirk impression.

_She hid in the closet. Her wrist swelled from being broken, again. They'd been married for three years, but he never so much as raised his voice to her until recently. The change in his behavior started a few weeks ago. _

_At first it was insults and derogatory comments about her with his buddies. The first time she protested about his treatment of her it had earned her a slap across the face. The second time had cost her a black eye. It had gotten worse since then. Every day he was becoming more violent. He demanded she quit her job, stay home, and take care of his every need. She wasn't allowed to leave the house. _

_This house, it had all started when they moved into this house. She wanted so much to leave here. Maybe if they left, things would go back the way they were. She had just found out they were expecting their first child. She held her breath when she heard the footsteps coming down the hall. The closet door opened._

Expecting to be dodging projectiles aimed at his head, Dean slowly opened the adjoining door. Instead of hurling things at him, she was kneeling on the floor by the bed, hunched over something.

Dean ran to her side, not sure of what had happened to her, but fearing something was wrong with her or the baby. As he got to her, he realized she was furiously drawing in her sketchbook again.

She must have had a vision right after leaving the other room, and he'd missed it.

Damn it! I should have been here for it, he thought.

Dean leaned over her shoulder trying to get a look at what she was drawing.

From what he could see, the woman in the picture looked like the loser in a heavyweight championship fight. There was a sketch of a man's hand holding a gun, he could tell that easily enough. What the hell…a young girl hanging from rafters? He moved around to kneel in front of her, to see if she was still there.

"Alyssa," he moved her hair away from her face, but she flinched back from his touch. "Hey, hey, hey. It's okay. What happened?"

He gently lifted the hair from her face revealing a red mark in the shape of a hand that lay across her cheek. "What the hell? Who did this to you?"

She didn't answer him. Her eyes seemed to look right through him.

"Alyssa, answer me!"

Suddenly she focused on him, tears threatening the corner of her eyes.

"I…don't…know. I came in here. I was going to throw something at you when you came in, but…everything went away. And I was in this house…" She couldn't put into words what she had felt; only what she had seen. But most of what her vision had been was emotional, very emotional.

"What happened? How did you get that mark on your face?" Dean's anger at whatever did this to her was not going to subside until someone or something was dead.

She looked down at what she had drawn. "He had the gun. She was hiding in the closet. He'd beaten her, broken her wrist." She pointed to the woman whose face was bloodied and beaten. "He shot her. And then he saw me. He saw me as if I were standing there in the house."

"Who hit you?"

She looked into Dean's eyes, seeing his anger. "Someone behind his eyes."

"Behind his eyes? How the hell did he hit you? It was a vision, right?" This wasn't normal. Sam's visions never left a mark on him.

"I don't know, Dean. But I felt him hit me." Her hand went to her face, feeling the heat of the handprint left behind.

"Sam!" Dean waited for the comforting sounds of his brother's hurried footsteps. Music to my ears, man. He helped Alyssa off the floor and set her down on the bed.

"What's wrong, Dean?" Sam had almost broken the door off its hinges getting in the room. He saw Alyssa's face and thought the worst of his brother for just a brief second. "You didn't do that, did you?"

"NO! I wouldn't hit a woman who didn't hit first. And besides, I wouldn't want to get hit by her again. I'm going to get some ice for her face. Keep an eye on her for a minute, okay."

"Alyssa, what happened?" he picked the sketchbook off the floor and examined the drawing. She didn't answer him at first. "Alyssa, please, what happened?"

"It was a vision. But he saw me. Someone in him saw me."

"What do you mean someone in him saw you?" Sam sat in one of the chairs, making sure to keep her in his line of sight in case something else should happen.

"He saw me, as if I were standing right next to him." She still couldn't explain how it had happened.

"You mean like with your dream walking? Someone can see you and talk to you in a dream. Like that?"

"Yeah. But I was awake, Sam." She could still see the eyes behind the eyes. They were dark and full of rage. She'd touched rage before, in Dean, but it wasn't the same as this. This rage was violent and deadly.

"What's with the girl hanging?" Sam pointed to the drawing.

"She was there, in the house. But…a different time…same house, different year, I think. She was sort of a shadow in the room."

"Did you get any ideas as to what's happening here? Anything we can work with?"

"I didn't see anything that could tell us who or where."

"Well, the girl's dress suggests early twentieth to late nineteenth century. Does that ring a bell?"

"I don't know, really. I remember the woman in the closet, the gun, and his eyes." She wanted desperately to shut it all out of her mind. The nightmares had begun to subside a bit, but now they'd be back in full force with fresh material.

Dean came back with an ice pack and set her up on the bed, leaning her against the headboard.

"You two figure anything out on that, yet?" he gestured towards the drawing as he placed the ice pack on Alyssa's left cheek.

"We have something to go on, sort of, but it'll have to wait until later." Sam headed off to his room to get dressed for his rendezvous at the airport.

"Why?"

"Sarah's flight arrives in a few hours." He went back to the room confident his brother had things under control, for now.

Dean smiled wide. His brother was finally reaching out to Sarah. Cool, he thought. At least he wouldn't be brooding all day long, worrying about his deal.

"Maybe you were right, Dean." Alyssa admitted.

Dean's eyebrows drew together, confused. What had he been right about? He thought.

"About sticking together. For now," she specified.

"Glad you see it my way."

"Don't push it," she warned him.

He took the warning seriously and silently resigned to stick to her like glue.

"It's only until the baby's born."

"Then what? You gonna hunt with a papoose on your back?"

"Aside from the fact that I'm shocked you know what a papoose is, I'm insulted you think I'd do that. I have no intentions of taking this kid along on hunts."

"You have a plan then. You're going to quit hunting and live at the cabin."

"Who said I was quitting?" She sat up, tossing the ice pack on the bed. There was going to be an argument, and she wasn't lying down for this one.

"What do you mean you're not quitting? If you're not going to take him along, then what do you plan to do with him while you're working a job?" Dean figured she would just stop and raise the kid. Now, she was going to trust someone to baby-sit for days, even weeks, while she worked a job. This was sounding a lot like his and Sam's lives all over again.

"This wasn't how I wanted to start this discussion, Dean. Not as an argument."

"What discussion?"

"Neither of us…" she needed to find the right words, "we can't raise a child in this life, knowing what we know, doing what we do, every day, not knowing if we'll make it back." She stared into his green eyes, feeling that familiar pull in her core, threatening to grab hold and never let her go. "I have someone searching for a family to adopt him." She prepared for the storm of anger to hit her as he processed what she had just told him.

Dean couldn't speak. The possibility of actually raising the child with her had never occurred to him. As a matter of fact, he hadn't thought about it much these past six months. He and Sam had been hot on the trail of the yellow-eyed demon and killing things along the way, leaving no time to think of the future. But here it was, the future staring him in the face. And he wasn't going to be a part of it.

She was considering adopting their son out to strangers. The anger in him wanted to swell, crash against her, and drown her, but he held it at bay, waiting for her to continue the conversation.

Alyssa wasn't sure if having him speechless was any better than having him yelling at her.

"It's only a consideration, not a definite yet," she sat on the edge of the bed, feeling the baby kicking against her ribs.

"I thought having a kid was all you ever wanted. It was your one dream, Alyssa." Dean sat next to her on the bed.

"I know." Her shoulders collapsed as his words cut through her. "It still is, but I don't know if I can just quit the job, raise a kid, and feel normal. I don't know how to do that."

Dean understood how she felt about the job. It had consumed his entire life, and the thought of just giving it all up just didn't sit well with him. So, how could he blame her for feeling the same?

"So, who gets the privilege of raising him?" He didn't know what else to think, what else to feel, or what to say. He secretly wished Sam were a part of this conversation. His little brother would help him argue some point, any point, but he didn't even know what point he needed to make.

"Someone who knows about the supernatural. A family who can protect him, teach him, and then let him decide if he wants to be a part of this world."

"Still sounds like we could do the same thing."

Alyssa had thought long and hard about her decision to adopt out her only child. The doctors had told her there were to be no more children in her future. She was still just as barren as she was when she was born.

How this miracle happened, no one could tell her. So, it hadn't been an easy decision to consider. She'd cried herself to sleep for two weeks weighing the pros and cons of what lay before her.

The incident with Jo and the Boogeyman confirmed it for her. She couldn't do the job and guarantee she could make it home to her son.

"Are you going to marry me, buy a house, get a dog, and work a nine to five job?" She tried to keep herself calm and walked to the window, looking out onto a normal world, a world oblivious to the reality that lay just beneath its placid surface. Her words slashed through her own heart, remembering Dean's deal. He wouldn't be here long enough to enjoy being a father if they didn't find some way to break the deal.

Marriage? He'd never even thought about it. A dog sounded like a good idea, but only if it didn't tear up the car. A regular job? Hell, he was trying to find a way to be alive in a year, considering a normal life and a real job hadn't even been in the plan.

He joined her at the window. "Look, I get it, okay. You want him to have a normal life. So do I, but I just don't know." He laid a hand on her shoulder, turning her around to face him. "Something in my gut tells me to wait on this."

She could see the sincerity in his eyes. He was just as scared and confused as she, but he kept it buried beneath the need to be strong and decisive.

"I've learned to trust gut feelings, so I trust yours." The sinking feeling in her chest was her heart plummeting into the dread of losing both her son and Dean. "I'll wait on making a final decision, but neither of us have much time left." She didn't mean for it to sound like it had come out, but they both knew she was right.


	7. Chapter 7

**Chapter Seven**

Sam paced at the airport listening to the intercom blaring airplane arrivals and departures. He'd gotten there two hours early just in case her flight landed ahead of schedule, but the slow passing of the time was grating against his nerves. To keep himself from exploding from nervousness, his thoughts strayed to Alyssa's new vision.

Somehow a spirit had come through a waking dream and physically affected the living world. How? There were no answers, not yet. It seemed as if their little break from hunting wasn't to be, and in the midst of it all, he was trying to find love.

His long legs kept him moving from one end of the gate to the other, as his mind tried to come up with a way to send Sarah home without upsetting her. Maybe she didn't need to go home. Maybe she could stay and be with him.

Would she be willing to go on the hunt with them? Should he let her make that decision? Now he was beginning to see Dean's point of view with Alyssa. Stopping Alyssa, however, was like stopping a raging wild fire with a water pistol. Maybe Sarah would be more understanding and listen to his reasoning.

Well, just have to play it by ear, I guess, he sighed to himself.

Her flight's arrival was announced over the intercom, sending the butterflies flitting through his stomach. Not one single thought of how he would send her away crossed his mind. He only wanted to see her and hold her. If Alyssa's new case could wait a day or two, he could enjoy Sarah's company, and then send her on her way to safety. He silently prayed for such an outcome.

He caught sight of her immediately. His six foot-four inch frame gave him the advantage of seeing over most other people's heads.

Her hair had grown longer, the French-braid slung over one shoulder. She wore a thick tan leather coat, complete with a fur-lined hood, offsetting the black jeans that disappeared boots that matched her coat.

She caught sight of him, putting a twinkle in her eye. The warmth of her smile spread through him. He hadn't felt like this for anyone since Jess. He had missed the feeling.

Sarah ran into his arms. The perpetual loneliness he'd felt for so long was driven away by the scent of her perfume, but it did nothing for the soreness in his back that reminded him of how close he had come to never seeing her again.

"Sam, I thought I'd never hear from you again," she spoke against his ear. "I'm so glad you called."

"Me, too. And sorry for not keeping in touch more, we've been really busy lately," he wished he could tell her everything, but not now. He wanted to enjoy her company, relish in her presence, and more.

They walked to baggage claim hand in hand. She had apparently packed for a long vacation with three large suitcases. Sam loaded her luggage in the Impala and set out for the hotel.

He was going to have to thank Alyssa for getting them a nicer place to stay. Sarah probably wouldn't have appreciated sleeping in rundown, shady motels they were used to frequenting.

Sam let Sarah talk about her father's auction house, her friends, content to just hear her voice, and answered as many of her questions as he could without scaring the crap out of her.

"So what's out here in South Dakota?"

"Family, sort of. We have a family friend here who helps us out when we need it. Dean and I grew up around him, so he's pretty much family." His explanation seemed to satisfy her for now. Everything else would have to come later.

Alyssa was examining the red mark on her face in the bathroom mirror. What the hell had enough power to touch her through a vision? Perhaps it wasn't just a vision.

Alyssa could walk into other people's dreams and experience what their subconscious minds cooked up. She had been able to walk into Dean's dreams to track down him and Sam. She had also shared visions with Sam. Could she be linking with someone who was dreaming these images? If so, how could she be doing it awake? But more disconcerting was how did it have the power to touch her in the physical plane?

"Alyssa, you okay in there?" Dean lightly rapped on the bathroom door.

"I'm fine. You can come in, I'm decent," she answered. He opened the door.

"Damn," he smirked. "Thought I was in for a treat." He turned her towards him inspecting the handprint on her face. "So, what do you think did this? And how?" He'd been ready to kill someone when he saw the mark on her. His rage was silently contained biding its time until it came face-to-face with whoever or whatever had hit her.

"Not sure. I'm thinking a waking dream maybe. Or someone else's vision." She winced, as he got closer to her eye.

"Well, I don't think it'll bruise. It should just fade away after a while. Got any make-up to cover it?"

"Sure, let me just whip out the foundation, eye shadow, and lipstick I keep stashed away in my purse," Alyssa answered sarcastically. "When the hell do I have the time and energy to put on make-up?"

"Sorry, I just thought you might have some in case of such emergencies. You know, a woman walking around with a black eye tends to get people involved, like the police."

"You're right," she looked at herself. It wasn't a black eye, but it was a pretty big red splotch across her face. She didn't want people thinking Dean had done this to her. She'd have to fight off the cops to protect him, and that would end up being a bad thing.

She went to her gear duffel and pulled out a bottle of foundation. She scooted past Dean standing in the bathroom doorway and shook it up.

"It's for emergencies only," she dared him to say something, anything.

"Yeah, emergencies," he walked out of the bathroom to let her do her face, chuckling to himself.

A few minutes later she emerged from the bathroom. She opened the curtains wide and looked into the light outside.

"So, does it look normal," she turned her face so the sunlight hit it directly. Dean checked every angle, moved her face in different directions to make sure nothing was visible.

"Looks great," he was about to let her go, when he noticed her eyes had gone wide and blank.

"Alyssa?"

She gasped as if the breath had been knocked from her.

"Alyssa!" She was having another vision, had to be.

She could see him. Dean was right there in front of her, but he was blurred. He was the background image of a picture. She tried to come back through the vision, focusing on him, but it wouldn't let her go. He wouldn't let her go.

_The vision came in flashes. Each scene was a second or so long and then quickly switched to the next one. The house, only different. A bedroom, a girl's room, maybe. She was hanging by a rope around her neck. A woman sees the young girl. Another room, two beds, young men, blood. A different bedroom, dead man on the floor, a dead woman with a rifle next to her. The man stood in front of her, blood all over him, his eyes empty of all life, but alive with fury. A hand closed around her throat as his face grinned. _

"Alyssa!" She'd collapsed into his arms like dead weight.

She could hear Dean calling to her, and she was trying to follow his voice, but something seemed to be dragging her away.

"C'mon, Alyssa." He was holding her, trying to get her to wake up. Panic rose in him quickly as her face paled. She seemed to be struggling to breathe.

Sam came running into the room, followed closely by Sarah.

"What's going on, Dean? I heard you all the way down the hall." He helped his brother hold up Alyssa's limp body. "What's happening to her?"

"She started having a vision, but something's wrong. It's like she's stuck. I can't get her out of it."

"Alyssa, can you hear me?" Sam lightly slapped her face, hoping to bring her back around. He looked to Sarah. "Could you get some towels and wet them down with cold water?" he waited until she headed into the bathroom and turned to Dean. "Did she say anything before it hit her?"

"No. She just went blank, and now she's barely breathing." Dean looked into Alyssa's eyes, knowing she was in there somewhere. What could he do to get her back? She needed a shock to get her back out.

"That's it. Cold water. Bring her in the shower," he ran past Sarah as she came out of the bathroom with the wet towels, waving a short, curt "hi". Sam followed behind him maneuvering Alyssa into the bathroom. "She needs a shock to get her back. Should work, I hope." He hopped in the shower and turned the water on, turning the dial to cold.

"Is that safe with her being pregnant?" Sarah didn't know who this woman was, but she seemed pretty important to them.

"Not sure, but it's the best option we have right now. Give her to me, Sam," he held out his arms, steadying himself to place her under the running water.

If her visions were getting stronger, strong enough to pull her into them and threaten her life, then…he didn't know what then. He just wanted her to wake up.

The darkness slowly swallowed her. She could hear her heartbeat in her ears, the blood slowing in her veins. She could still hear his voice calling her, but it was further away now. The eyes of a dead man stared into hers as the blackness around her grew closer, pulling her into it.

The cold water from the showerhead hit her full force.

She gasped for air as if she'd just broken the surface of water, needing to breathe after a struggle to get to life-sustaining oxygen. She grabbed Dean's neck, burying her face into his throat like he was her only way out of the dark depths.

"Thank you," he whispered against her skin, gripping her tight.

Sam and Sarah could only stand and watch as the cold water had literally brought her back from death.

"Sam, is she okay?" Sarah whispered, touching his arm. Who was she to them?

Sam could see the questions in Sarah's eyes. Time to tell her everything, well almost everything. He took her hand and led her out of the bathroom. He caught Dean's eyes as he shut the door. He was truly scared.

Alyssa trembled in Dean's arms, not wanting to let him go for fear the vision would grab her again, and this time, not let her go.

She held onto him as if her life depended on it, which meant she was petrified, and that wasn't a comforting thing for him to see in Alyssa. She didn't usually scare this easily.

He shut off the water, realizing they were soaked to the bone, with no clean, dry clothes to change into. Thankfully, one of the many hotel's amenities included a laundry service.

After some clean, dry clothes had been delivered, Alyssa warmed up with as hot a shower as she was allowed.

"Are you okay?" Sam had been explaining Alyssa's part in their warped family to Sarah when she came out of the bathroom, escorted by Dean.

"I'm fine," she met the eyes of Sam's new friend.

Sam made quick with the introductions. "Alyssa, this is Sarah. Sarah, this is Alyssa."

"Nice to meet you, Sarah," Alyssa held out her hand.

"Nice to meet you, too," she shook Alyssa's hand and smiled genuinely.

"I hope I didn't scare you," Alyssa sat on the bed. She wondered how this seemingly prim and proper young woman had come to know the guys.

"I was just explaining to Sarah what had happened," Sam said.

As if reading Alyssa's mind, Dean offered an explanation, "We met Sarah in New York, chasing down a killer painting."

"Oh, sounds fun," she gave him a 'wish I'd been there' look.

"Wasn't that much fun," Sarah seemed surprise that a pregnant woman would think that being chased by the ghost of a killer preteen could be fun. It had been a horrible nightmare for her.

Sam, Dean, and Alyssa all laughed at Sarah's remark.

She seemed a bit put off by their enjoyment of her ignorance.

Sam consoled her, "Alyssa's a hunter, too, Sarah. She's a very powerful hunter. And before the baby, she could hold her own just fine."

"I can hold my own just fine, baby or no baby," Alyssa furrowed her brow and narrowed her eyes. Could this be a challenge? Alyssa never gave in to a challenge.

"My mistake. Sorry. Alyssa can hold her own just fine, no matter what," he held his hands up in a surrendering gesture.

Damn, she thought. He's no fun today.

"You do what they do?" Sarah pointed to both Dean and Sam.

"Yep, but I have an edge," Alyssa pointed to her head. "I can do things they can't."

"And sometimes this," Dean pointed to her head as well, "does things to you. Wanna give up the goods on what that was all about?"

"I think it was a murder-suicide," she closed her eyes momentarily, "and it looked like it was in the late 19th to early 20th century, so you were right Sam. Not sure of where, though. A woman killed two young men and what I believe to be her husband and then herself. It had something to do with the girl's suicide."

Sam was already tapping the keyboard of his laptop searching the World Wide Web for anything that matched her description.

"Think I got it. Seems an entire family was found dead in a home in Oklahoma in the early 1900s. The fifteen-year-old daughter, Magdalena was found hanging from the beams of her bedroom ceiling. The mother, Elizabeth, was found with a rifle near her. She was believed to have killed her two stepsons, Isaiah and Zachariah, while they slept in their beds. She then shot her husband, Jedidiah, and then herself. No one knew why she did it, but it was rumored through the town that the husband severely abused the wife on a daily basis. She was seen around the town numerous times with black eyes, cuts, and bruises." Sam quoted from the archival scan of the old newspaper.

"That's her," she retrieved the sketchbook from the table and pointed to her drawing of the girl hanging, "Magdalena. Maddie."

"But what does this have to do with you?" Dean wanted to know why she was getting visions of this. Sam's visions had been linked to the yellow-eyed demon. He wondered if they would continue now that the demon was dead. But that was for later, much later.

"I don't know."

"Why weren't you breathing?" Dean kept questioning her.

"After I saw the flashes of memories, he was there, Jedidiah. He saw me again. His eyes were the same I saw in the man who shot his wife in the closet. He was grinning…" she faltered a bit with her explanation, "as he…" Alyssa put her hands to her throat. She felt her scars; they were sore.

Dean moved her hair back to see what she was rubbing. There were prints on her neck, developing into bruises. Pressure points of fingers were right where someone would place their hands in an attempt to kill someone by choking them. The idea that something in Oklahoma, in the past, could reach this far and kill sent goose bumps up his spine.

"Have you ever been to this house," Sam spun his laptop around, showing her a picture of the house from a real estate website. The house was recently put up for sale.

"No. I'd remember." What was the connection? Maybe there wasn't one. "I don't think it has anything to do with the house. I'm not sure, but it feels like I'm picking up something from Maddie. She's calling for my help, and Jedidiah's stepping in the way."

"Why can't she use the phone like everyone else," his contempt for the dead was beginning to peak. Dean had lost his brother briefly and had almost lost her, now twice.

How much more was he supposed to suffer? Was this part of the deal he'd made? To watch his loved ones hang just out of the Reaper's reach?

"If only it were that easy. Sam, could you do some more research on the house? I think our vacation just got cut short. Dean and I will take this. You stay here with Sarah and enjoy yourselves," she got up to start packing.

"No way. I'm not staying here to let you two run off and get into trouble," he remembered she was sitting right next to him, "if that's okay with you, Sarah. I know you just got here, but I'd understand if you wanted to head back as soon as possible."

"I'm not going anywhere. The return ticket is for a week out. I'll tag along. Not sure what I'm getting myself into, but I guess I need to know more don't I?" She looked at Sam with admiration. His family was very important to him, and he would go to the ends of the earth to be there for them.

Sam and Sarah left to his room to do more research on the house. Dean and Alyssa sat in silence until they were gone.

"So does she know the full extent of what she's getting into?" Alyssa asked Dean about Sarah.

"Sort of," he responded. "She held herself together pretty good in New York."

"This isn't New York, Dean, and this isn't some haunted painting. I don't know what we're about to face, but it's strong, whatever it is."

"I could say the same for you. Something along the lines you shouldn't be doing this. You should try to shut this down so you or the kid won't get hurt." Dean held up his hands as he saw Alyssa's eyes narrow. "But I won't say it, because I know it wouldn't do any good to try and stop you."

"So, you're saying it won't do any good to try and stop Sarah, either?" Alyssa had to give Sam's new woman a certain amount of respect for her tenacity.

"Probably. I'm not going to try. If Sam feels she's in danger, he'll say something to her." He stopped for a moment and thought back to how Sarah had been eager to stop the painting from killing the people who bought it. "But I doubt even that would work."

Dean and Alyssa busied themselves with cleaning their weapons, while Sam and Sarah continued their research on the house and its ghosts.

"Dean," Alyssa reassembled her Glock.

"Yeah." He was disassembling his own 9mm.

"I know we've decided to wait on a decision about the baby, but there's something I think we need to talk about that can't wait."

"What?" Dean was hoping this new discussion didn't have anything to do with the demon and his deal. He wasn't in the mood to talk about his rash decision-making process. He just wanted to clean his guns for they were long overdue for a good oiling.

"Even if we do decide, together, that we can't raise him, there's a clause that will be included in the adoption to make sure he keeps the name we give him, whatever name we give him."

Dean sat quietly, not sure of what to think about this conversation. He hadn't even thought about giving his son a name. It had never occurred to him to even consider acknowledging the child. Yet, something in him had taken a stand against her decision to adopt their son out to strangers. Emotions he never thought he'd feel raged through him and demanded she think over the decision and allow them to make it together.

And now, she was asking him to make another decision, something that would stay with his son for the rest of his life, a name.

Alyssa could feel the turmoil in his mind rushing through the air around them. She'd caught him off guard asking him to help her choose a name for their son. Guilt and shame washed over her. She wasn't supposed to have been able to have a child, and somehow, with powers she no longer possessed, a child was conceived. His child.

"I know it's not something you've ever thought about, so I kind of chose one on my own. If that's okay." Her heart felt as if it should be hiding behind a door somewhere waiting to hear the roar of an angry man.

"You thought of a name already?" Should he listen to it? Would it be something outrageous, hippie, or deranged?

"Yeah. What do you think of John David Winchester?" She hadn't thought of asking Dean to name their child after their fathers.

"I get that the John is my father, but where's the David come from?"

"My father. It wasn't his fault what he did to my mother. He hated himself for having succumbed to the demon and doing that to her. He deserves my forgiveness, and this is how I feel I can let him have it."

"Hang on." Dean walked to the adjoining door to Sam's room and knocked. He disappeared into the room for a moment and returned with Sam, his brow drawn and serious.

"What's going on, Dean?" Sam looked to Alyssa and Dean as if something was terribly wrong.

"Alyssa and I have talked about some things about the kid."

"Really? Like what?" Sam seemed almost overjoyed his brother had actually been talking to Alyssa about the baby. It was definitely a step in the right direction.

"Well," Alyssa began, "a name, for starters."

"John David Winchester." Dean finished for her. "What do you think? Alyssa came up with it." He gave the credit where the credit was due.

"John David Winchester." Sam rolled the name off his tongue. "David is your father's name, right?"

"Yes. It's a way of honoring both of our fathers. If that's okay with you."

After a moment of reflection, a smile spread across his face. "Sounds perfect to me. John David Winchester."

"Hey, and his initials will be J.D. How's that?" he clapped Sam across the shoulder. "That's a manly name, J.D. I like it." Dean beamed his approval.

"Me, too. Thank you, Alyssa," Sam gave Alyssa a long brotherly hug.

"Then it's settled. John David Winchester. We need a beer. Oh, sorry, Alyssa. How about a soda for you?" Dean ran out of the room looking for three beers and a tall soda.


	8. Chapter 8

**Chapter Eight**

Since the rooms had been reserved for a week, Sam and Dean thought it best to wait it out and see what they could find out about the house and the long dead owners. Alyssa hadn't suffered any more visions, so it seemed safe to pursue the case.

Sam and Sarah took turns calling the realtor to talk about the availability of the house and to work her for more information on the house's history.

Sarah sweet-talked the nice realtor into revealing some pertinent information about the last homeowners. She hung up and relayed what she had discovered.

"Well, it seems the last couple to own the house did so over a month ago. The house just went back up on the market. The investigation by authorities led them to the husband. He was covered in blood and his wife's body was never found. Poor woman," she shook her head.

Sam looked up Sarah's information on the Internet and found more cases that were related to the house.

"That's not all. An elderly couple that had been married for over 50 years lived in the same house two years ago. The wife was found beaten to death and the husband had died of a heart attack. He was also covered in her blood. Looks like something in that house hates women."

"How far back does this go?" Dean was packing his bag. Alyssa had finished her packing earlier and was sitting on the bed, crossed-legged. She looked tired after having been up most of the night with the baby kicking the hell out of her. Dean was sure she would sleep on the drive to Oklahoma.

"Not sure. Hang on," Sam intently studied his screen. "Wow. It goes way back. Whole families have been affected too. A family of five moved into the house back in 1986. A year later, they were all dead. It was a murder-suicide case. The wife killed her daughter, her two sons, her husband, and then herself." He sat stunned. What had they come across that could kill entire families?

"Was the wife beaten? Were there any bruises or abuse found on the daughter?" Alyssa had a hunch. She was probing to see if it could go anywhere.

"It says the wife was beaten, but they didn't find anything on the daughter. Oh, wait. The coroner said the daughter had some indications of sexual abuse. He said it looked as though she may have been raped. Why? You have an idea?" Sam watched the emotions play over Alyssa face.

"Yeah, but it's not something I want to think about in depth right now." She settled herself down. The thought of the girls being subjected to such horrors was far too much for her.

Sarah could only sit in the chair next to Sam and stare at the pictures of the house, the photos of the women who had been so badly abused, and wonder how she could have never known about this world. These people needed help, and the only ones willing to do the job were the three hunters in the room.

"I don't care what it is, because it's dead when we get there," Dean was slamming his clothes into the duffel bag as his anger rose to a critical level. He hadn't cut his life short just to watch those he cared for being tortured and killed by some pissed off spirit.

They needed to solve this case as quickly as possible. He and Sam needed to find a way out of his deal. Each day that passed was one less day he was going to be on this earth.

"Dean, stop. I'm fine." The redness on her face had dissipated, and the bruises on her neck had almost faded.

"Until the next time. What if you can't come back? What if I can't stop it? What then?"

He was angry and rightly so. She knew taking this job would put her and the baby in jeopardy, but she couldn't let it go.

She moved off the bed, standing next to him, holding his hand as it gripped the duffel bag.

"Then we will get through it together," She looked into his depthless green eyes, willing herself to stay here in the now, "just like we have before."

Her words gave him the sense that things would work out, but his mind wandered back to how close they had all come to falling to the yellow-eyed demon's plans. Alyssa had won that battle, even against Sam himself, and pulled them all out, almost at the cost of her own life.

"We should get going. It's a long drive to Oklahoma. We need to stop by Bobby's and let him know what we're up to." Dean led the way.

Sam drove Alyssa's Camaro with Sarah in the passenger seat, while Alyssa rode shotgun with Dean in the Impala. They would leave the Camaro at the yard and take the Impala to Oklahoma.

Leaving the car wasn't the only reason for a stop at Bobby's. Ellen and Bobby had been hard at work looking for a way for Dean to get out of his deal, and Dean hoped they could find a way that wouldn't cost Sam his life.

Bobby was as gracious a host could be living in the center of a junkyard. He'd offered Sarah a beer, but she declined.

He and Ellen hadn't found anything yet. There were some references to negating a deal with a demon simply by announcing that the deal was no longer viable and accepting God into one's life. However, that was more religious mumbo-jumbo than reality. They'd keep trying though.

Ellen wasn't too thrilled with the addition of another woman in the mix. She'd had her reservations about Alyssa being involved in all of this, now with Sam bringing Sarah along for the ride, she couldn't take it.

"Are you guys nuts? You can't get people involved who have no idea what's going on. You're putting their lives in danger. You Winchesters are all alike, you know. You don't stop to think about others. You just go in balls out blasting anything and everything and not caring who gets hurt in the process." She looked at Alyssa. "And you have no right to place that innocent child in danger to keep your own pride fed. You're as bad as they are."

Dean was about to say something to Ellen, but Alyssa placed a hand on his chest, stopping him mid-breath. She was going to take this now. Her opportunity had been halted before, but not this time. Dean gave her a 'be nice' look to which she responded with a quick flick of her eyebrow to say 'fat chance'.

"You and me, outside, right now," she led the way to the door, holding it open for Ellen staring her straight in the eyes. Ellen believed she could talk some sense into the young woman and convince her to run as far from the Winchesters as possible.

Bobby, Dean, and Sam stared at each other wondering who would be the first to have to go out there and rescue Ellen. None of them wanted to be the poor sap that had to get mixed up in the storm that was about to blow through the world.

"Is there something wrong?" Sarah asked innocently.

Finally alone with the over-bearing motherly type person, Alyssa let it all go.

"Butt out, Ellen."

"Those boys are just like their father. They're dangerous. They almost got my daughter killed on a job."

"Your daughter is trying too hard to be like her father. Who's to blame for that?"

"Well, I…." Ellen stammered.

"Yeah, you." Alyssa stepped closer to Ellen. "You have no right to give your motherly advice, Ellen. I had a mother. She's dead. I don't need you to take her place. And as far as I'm concerned, you'd be a poor substitute. John Winchester was a hard ass, I know. But he was also a great hunter, and a hell of a man. If it weren't for him, I'd be dead. He didn't have to save my life or bring me here to Bobby."

"John was reckless. Just like his boys." Ellen wasn't so sure of herself in this argument anymore.

"Sam and Dean have done nothing but try to do their best to help others and find the thing that destroyed their family. I don't care how you feel about any of them, because what happened to your husband has nothing to do with them. And as far as my baby is concerned, I will decide when it's time to quit. Not you, not them, no one. Just me. So back off, now."

"How do you know what happened to my Bill?"

"Not too bright are you? I'm a dream walker, Ellen. I've seen things in other people's dreams that would turn your hair white. Bill's death was an accident, yes, but he knew full well the risks he took every time he walked out that door."

Tears had formed in Ellen's eyes. She knew Bill had known that each time he left, it may be his last and he wouldn't be coming home.

Ellen had planned to snap back her with own remarks, but she didn't have time before she had to catch Alyssa in her arms.

"DEAN! SAM! BOBBY!" She couldn't let her fall on the hard, graveled ground, so she stood there trying to cradle her in her arms. All three men came rushing outside followed by Sarah. Dean took Alyssa from Ellen's arms.

"What happened, Ellen?" He already knew it was another vision.

"She was yelling at me and then her eyes rolled up in her head and she went limp. Is she breathing?"

"Alyssa, can you hear me? Yeah, she's breathing this time. But don't know for how long," Dean wondered how close this one would come. He carried her into the house, laying her on the couch, and silently praying to whatever God there was to get her out of this one alive.

"What's happening to her?" Ellen felt a twinge of responsibility for whatever was happening to Alyssa.

Sam answered her, "She's having a vision. Something to do with the house in Oklahoma and the deaths connected to it."

"She has visions like you, Sam?" Was she one of the demon's children?

"No, not like mine. Her visions are inherited."

"Lucky girl, I think." At least she wasn't connected to the demon.

_She could see the windows were opened in the house. The breeze danced with the curtains. The sunlight shown bright, chasing the shadows from the corners of the rooms. He was under the sink, fixing the plumbing. The woman leaning over to speak to the plumber was dressed in a professional manner. She seemed concerned that the whole house may need new pipes. He told her she would need to make another appointment for that kind of estimate. But she kept persisting he take a look and let her know immediately. _

_The plumber wasn't a very big man, close to six foot with his boots on. His uniform of dark blue pants and light blue button-down shirt were filthy with the days' work. He now stood in front of the sink, plunking the pipe wrench over and over again in the palm of his hand. He was very upset with her having spoken disrespectfully to him. Alyssa could feel the rage in the air. The woman, seemed to be the realtor, pointed out she had an appointment for the house to be viewed in a few days. Everything had to be in place for the prospective buyers. _

_Alyssa realized they were supposed to be there in a few days; this was happening now. 'Run! Please run! Get out of the house!' she tried to scream to the woman. The air crackled as the plumber hit the woman across the face with the wrench. She went down with a sickening thud. The plumber looked at her. He could see her. No not the plumber; it was him. He could see her. He started towards her raising the wrench above his head._

"Alyssa!" Dean slapped her hard enough to wake her, but not to do any damage. The contact of his hand against her face echoed through the living room. She sucked in air as her eyes came into focus.

Dean breathed a sigh of relief, as did everyone else in the room.

Alyssa's looked around, searching for the plumber with the dead eyes. She was in Bobby's house, but she couldn't recall how she'd gotten there.

Dean helped her up off the couch, holding her trembling body to his. "What did you see this time?" He checked her for bruises, red marks, or any other bodily harm. There was nothing, this time.

"Someone's dead," she spoke low, letting Dean look her over.

"Let's get you some water," Bobby helped Dean walk her to the dining table.

"What do you mean 'someone's dead'?" he took the chair next to her.

"We won't be talking to the realtor. If she's not dead, she'll be in a coma. The plumber attacked her, hitting her over the head with a wrench," she thanked Bobby for the water and sipped it slowly waiting for everyone to take a seat.

"So you saw the present or the future?" Sam was intrigued. His visions hadn't skipped across the time periods like hers.

"Well, it's either today or tomorrow, but she did say the house was supposed to be shown in a few days. That means us, right?"

"Yeah, I'll go make a call to the realtor's office. See what I can find out," Sam ducked out of the house to make the long distance call to Forgan, Oklahoma. He hoped the nice lady he and Sarah had been talking with was still alive.

"What else?" Dean could see she was scared about something.

"He saw me, again." She still couldn't understand how a spirit had the power to see her in a vision.

"Who saw you?" Ellen hadn't seen Sam have a vision, but if it was anything like what she had just witnessed, she didn't want to see it again.

"Jedidiah," Alyssa whispered.

"The plumber's name is Jedidiah?" Bobby was unaware of what had been happening.

"No. Jedidiah is the spirit that's attacking the women. Well, he's not really attacking them. He's influencing men who enter or live in the house, making them like him."

"Like him how?" It was Ellen's turn with a question.

"Violent. Very, very violent." Alyssa gripped her glass as she remembered the look in the plumber's eyes, Jedidiah's eyes.

"Why has he focused on you, though?" Bobby felt her fear, and Alyssa afraid of something meant it was one bad mother.

"I think his daughter, Magdalena, has been trying to get to me. She's bringing me the visions, but he somehow gets control and…" She stopped, not knowing if she should tell Bobby about the attacks on herself.

"And what?" Bobby asked.

"And he attacks her, physically. She's been hit and choked already." Dean answered the older man's question.

"How the hell can a vision leave a physical mark?" Ellen hadn't heard of anything like she was hearing now.

"Not sure, really," Alyssa answered. She'd been trying to figure that part out herself.

Sam came back into the house, walking slowly, his brow scrunched over his saddened eyes. The news wasn't good. "The realtor died yesterday. The plumber attacked her with a wrench. He's in custody right now."

"That decides that, huh? Guess we should get going," Alyssa finished her water and led the way to the car, not looking back at the others.


	9. Chapter 9

**Chapter Nine**

It had been a very long three-day drive. Sam and Dean had taken shifts behind the wheel with Alyssa and Sarah taking their turns at navigating.

They arrived in Forgan, Oklahoma, just as the sun was setting. Alyssa paid for two rooms in the local motel, which wasn't as nice as their previous temporary residence, but it would have to do for now.

The two couples decided to dine out in actual restaurant to welcome Sarah to the fold and to eat some real food.

Alyssa caused a ruckus as she informed Dean she neglected to pack her dining-out black dress and her dress heels. It had been a choice of dressing for a fancy dinner or dressing to stay alive.

Dean could only hope she had a black dress with high heels. He'd like to see her in something like that someday soon.

She caught him in the midst of that thought, seeing it in his eyes, and kissed him like she was wearing that very outfit. She eventually found something presentable to wear, and they made their way to the restaurant.

Dinner had gone pleasantly as the three hunters shared stories of their previous jobs to amuse and scare Sarah. It was best to give her a taste of what she had gotten herself into if she planned on sticking around.

Alyssa excused herself to the restroom. Sarah offered to go with her, but Alyssa declined as pleasantly as she could.

"I'm capable of going to the restroom all by myself. Thank you, though." Alyssa walked away, rubbing her forehead.

"Did I say something wrong?" She turned to Sam. Alyssa had seemed rather upset with her.

"No," he chuckled. "Alyssa doesn't quite fit the mold of your typical woman. She didn't have the normal teenage life of hanging out with friends, going to movies and on dates, and the whole group-of-girls-going-to-the-bathroom-together thing. She's okay."

Sam had seen the look on Alyssa's face and was worried. He looked at Dean and tipped his head hinting for him to follow her.

"Excuse me, I'll be right back," Dean got the hint and followed Alyssa to the back of the restaurant and down the hallway.

The women's bathroom was located right across from the men's. He faked heading for the men's listening for anything of interest coming from the women's. He couldn't hear any voices coming from the other side of the door, so he slowly pushed it open making sure to peek around first so as not to alarm any women who may be in compromising positions.

She was leaning against the countertop, the water running in the sink. Her white knuckles gripped the edge of the countertop. He rushed to her side. Was she in labor? Was the baby coming early?

Dean pulled her to face him holding her shoulders. Her long hair moved enough to reveal the blood on her lip. He touched the side of her face causing her to hiss in pain. There was a huge bruise just under her eye on her cheekbone. He knew what that was from, she'd been punched.

"How the hell did he do that?" He was going to strangle that apparition the moment he caught his wispy ass.

"He didn't." Alyssa didn't want to tell him what she'd seen this time. She kept her eyes down, not wanting to look at Dean.

"Who did it?"

She remained silent, seeing the replay of the vision in her mind's eye.

"Alyssa, who did this to you?"

Knowing she couldn't keep it a secret, and he had a right to know, she told him. "You did," she whispered through her swollen lip.

"Me? How the hell did I do that?" He thought for a moment. She was having visions of the past and present. Perhaps this one was a vision of the future, a future where he hit her. "I'll be right back. Don't move, okay."

He left her in the bathroom to fetch Sam and Sarah. Sam knew something was wrong before he made it to the table.

"What's wrong? Is it the baby?" He'd seen something flash across Alyssa's face at the table.

"Keep it down. She's had another vision. This time she's pretty banged up. We need to get out of here without causing a scene. Pay the check and bring the car around the back. We're going out through the kitchen." He grabbed their coats and made for the restroom.

"Is she okay?" Sarah knew this was bad, but she had no idea just how bad it was going to get.

"Not sure. Have to wait and see when we get her in the car," Sam paid the check and hurried to the car. No one was paying them any mind so it was safe to bring the car around the back.

"C'mon. I got you," Dean wrapped her coat around her, making sure to hide her face with her hair.

They made a beeline for the kitchen. It was busy tonight, so he tried to maneuver her through the many cooks hoping to be invisible. Unfortunately his plan wasn't working, and they were beginning to cause quite the stir.

"Pregnant. Labor pains. Gotta go," he lied. The sea of white clothed people parted allowing them to continue to the exit without any further delays.

"Geez," was all Sam could muster when he saw the damage to Alyssa's face. "What the hell happened this time?"

"Just drive, Sam," Dean didn't want to discuss this in the car.

"Drive to the house," Alyssa's voice defied her current condition. She wasn't backing down from this. She wanted to see what she was up against. "Now."

"Not a good idea considering," Dean protested.

"I don't care. I want to face this bastard head on. I'm not letting him think he's getting the best of me. It gives him too much power." She'd figured that much out during this last round. "I need to know who or what this is all about."

"What do you mean?" Dean moved the hair back from her eyes. Once again his hidden rage fired up against the thing that did this to her.

Save it for the fight, he told himself.

"Just get me there, and I'll know more," she settled into the crook of Dean's arm to wait out the ride. Please, don't let this one come true; she begged the heavens blinking back the tears.

They arrived at the house just after nine. The moon did it's best to light their way, but their solemn mood had significantly darkened the night.

Alyssa got out telling the men to stay in the car. She didn't want them anywhere near this place right now. She wouldn't be going in. She just wanted to touch whatever was there, try to feel her way around the place from the safety of the front yard.

The house itself seemed innocent enough. It didn't have that Amityville look to it or anything. It was a quaint, simple plantation style home. However, the shadows that danced across it did nothing to quell the nerves of its newest visitors.

Alyssa stood facing the front of the house, daring it to divulge its secrets. She thought she caught movement in the upper floor windows, but it could very well have been the shadows moving in the moonlight. She opened herself, allowing her mind to accept what was to be told.

Dean felt the familiar sensation of needles dancing across his skin. It wasn't as strong as it had been before their run-in with the demon, but it was still there.

Sam was worried about feeling the pull, the need to have her, but he was relieved to only feel his skin crawling.

Sarah noticed a change as well. She shivered as if she were cold even though the heater was blowing full force in the car.

"What the hell?" Dean watched as Alyssa removed her coat. Seeing her from the back, he couldn't even tell she was seven months pregnant. She'd kept in shape training her muscles to compensate for the shrinking space and added weight.

It wasn't how she looked that had him worried. The weather wasn't bad, but it wasn't the tropics either. It had to be at least close to freezing outside. He started to get out, but Sam stopped him.

"Wait, Dean. Do you see that?" he noticed the air around her was pulsing.

"What's she doing?" Sarah looked around Sam to wanting to see what they could see.

"She's trying to sense the energies in the house. She's kind of like an EMF meter. She can find the ghost energies without actually going in the house," Sam hoped that explained it enough for her, because it was far too complicated to get into right now.

"Oh," this was way weird, but she was up for an adventure. Beats totaling numbers at the auction house, she thought.

"She's going to freeze to death," Dean got out of the car and slowly made his way to Alyssa's side. He didn't want to disturb her while she worked her mojo, but it was freaking cold and he didn't want her to come down sick on top of everything else.

"Are you getting anything?" he whispered. There was no one else around, why the hell was he whispering?

"It's the daughter trying to talk to me, but the father is stronger. He's looking for something."

"What is he looking for?" Dean stood behind her, his hands on her shoulders. She was warm. No wonder she took the coat off.

"His sons. The mother is there too, but she's too weak to stop him. The sons aren't here. It's the father, the mother, and the daughter. No, wait. Not his daughter."

Alyssa shivered as pieces of the story came to her. "Her daughter. His sons. The sons did something horrible to her. That's why she killed herself. The mother was so upset she killed his sons and then him."

She pulled her energy back, cutting off the connection with whoever was talking to her. She'd seen enough for now, probably more than she would ever want to see of the spirits in the house.

Dean retrieved her coat from the grass and placed it over her shoulders. "We can talk about it back at the motel. C'mon." Dean held her in his arms as they walked back to the car.

The motel rooms were modestly decorated. The beds were clean, the carpets shampooed regularly, and the towels freshly bleached.

Alyssa showered, thinking of the images she had seen at the house. There was so much pain, torment, and violence coming from that house. As the warm water washed over her, she tried to forget the horrors she'd seen.

She was so engrossed in erasing the images from her mind, she didn't hear Dean come into the bathroom or notice he joined her in the shower until his hands found her shoulders. She melted into him, letting his body against hers erase the events of the evening, hoping with all her heart and soul her latest vision would never come to fruition.

"So, what happened in the restaurant?" Dean was toweling off as Alyssa pulled her robe over her shoulders.

"We were in the house. You turned to look at me, and it wasn't you anymore. Your eyes were his eyes." She didn't want to remember the rest, but it had already played out in her mind, in living detailed color.

"How did you get the shiner?" He wrapped the towel around his hips and stood next to the sink, waiting to hear the rest of the story.

She couldn't look in his eyes. It tore at her to know his green eyes would hold such hatred and anger towards her.

"Hey," he saw the fear blink across her face, and then it was gone in a flash, "whatever it is, we can stop it. It won't happen. Just tell me."

"I know." She couldn't say the words that were dying to come out; instead she straightened herself and pushed her feelings further into the vault of unrequited emotions that was quickly filling. She took a deep breath and continued, "I saw you change, become angry with me, and then you hit me, twice."

"Twice? So those are two different hits?" he drew her face to meet his, lightly touching the bruising on her cheek and the swollen lip.

"Yes," she whispered, willing herself to not break down in his arms, tell him how frightened she was, and beg him to never let her go.

They already had an understanding of what each of them meant to the other, but this kind of threw a monkey wrench into the metalwork.

She could only think to herself how could he be so angry with her to actually cause her physical harm? She knew deep within him was a rage so buried, so uncontrolled it had fed her own during their battle with the Yellow-Eyed Demon, but how did it get to the point of being the catalyst for a spirit such as Jedidiah? She hadn't a clue, and she hoped with all her heart and soul they could put the spirit to rest, or destroy it, before they really found out.

Sam and Sarah had their own plans for the night starting with some television viewing stretched out on the bed. However, the local programming was the furthest thing from both their minds.

Sarah couldn't believe her life had changed so much from the mundane existence she knew before to witnessing the extraordinary abilities of one woman facing a benevolent spirit.

And here she was, with this man who had grown up in this world. This was normal for him. He was comfortable here, chasing the unseen, battling the unknown. How could she possibly fit in here? Should she even try?

Sam could see Sarah's internal turmoil. It was plastered across her face dancing in the lights of the television screen. She was feeling out of place, had no idea what to do, what to think, or what to feel about all of this. He had never told Jessica the secret of his life, and it had gotten her killed. Could he do this again? Could he place another woman in the path of his dangerous life? Was the demon's death a chance for him to fall in love? Would she be safe now?

"Sarah, if you want to leave, I'll understand." Sam's heartbeat seemed to pause waiting for her answer.

"I don't want to leave, Sam. I was just thinking..." How did she put it into words what she was thinking? She wasn't going to lie to him. He'd been brutally honest with her about what he does, so he deserved her complete honesty as well. "I was thinking about how you grew up in this, all these years of chasing ghosts."

"It wasn't the ideal childhood, but I wouldn't trade it for anything." He looked deep within himself and knew those last words to be absolutely true. No matter how difficult it had been moving from town to town, school to school, the days without Dad around, the many times of staying with other hunters like Pastor Jim, Caleb, and Bobby, Sam knew his childhood had been anything but normal, but he wouldn't be here now if it weren't for all they'd been through.

No, it hadn't been the best childhood for himself and his brother. And if it weren't for this life, he and Jessica would have been married by now, enjoying their lives as newlyweds. However, he and Dean had grown closer as brothers over the last couple of years. The strengthening loyalty between them could never be broken. And in all of this, through all of their battles so far, he had come to meet a woman such as Sarah. How could this life not have been worth it?

The thought of Dean's desperate act tugged at him. If they hadn't been in this life, hadn't followed in their father's footsteps, then Dean would be safe. He wouldn't have died leading his brother to forego his own soul to save him. This life had cost them so much, and yet he couldn't bring himself to stop, for anything or anyone.

The silence hung in the air as a fog hangs over the waters of a placid lake. Sarah knew of no words to ease the sorrow she saw in Sam's eyes. She could only think of one way to take his mind off his troubles. She leaned over his torso and kissed him, hoping he wanted the same.

She smelled of roses, and her skin was like silk. As her lips found his, he felt the world slip away. All his fears and worries seemed to just fade into the beauty that was this woman. He needed to be closer to her, to bathe himself in her scent, and lose himself in her.

Their bodies spoke the words their lips could not find, each of them wanting the other to know and feel what lay hidden deep within their heart and soul.


	10. Chapter 10

**Chapter Ten**

Sam lay awake, basking in the afterglow of being with Sarah. She was asleep in the crook of his arm, her back lay against his chest, with her body spooned by his. He thought of how his life had changed the past two years and how his life could very well change again. Dean's imminent demise crossed his mind once again. He knew he wouldn't be able to sleep, so Sam slid out from under Sarah and dressed in the bathroom.

Dean, too, lay awake with his arms wrapped around Alyssa. His thoughts were not on the past or what lay ahead for his future. He was thinking of what Alyssa had said about his being responsible for the beating she'd received during the last vision. He was pretty good at reading people, too, and knew there was more, but Alyssa wasn't talking.

Not wanting to wake her, but knowing he wouldn't be sleeping any time soon, Dean made his own way out of the bed, put on clean clothes, and quietly snuck out of the room.

Unaware each was doing what the other had planned, Dean and Sam walked out of their rooms at the same time, frightening themselves and each other.

"I was just going out for a beer," Dean whispered.

"So was I," Sam replied, cautiously.

Dean stared at his brother a moment longer, and smiling, patted him on the shoulder. "Cool. Let's go."

The brothers found the bar across the street from the motel. It was just like all the other bars they'd been to across the country, smoke-filled, dingy, and full of drunk, unruly patrons.

Sam and Dean ordered their beers from the bartender and took a table at the back of the bar, away from the crowds.

"You couldn't sleep?" Dean asked of his little brother.

"No. You?" Sam took a swig of his beer, hoping his older brother wouldn't want the details of his night with Sarah.

"No." He could tell his brother had gotten some action with Sarah, but he wasn't in the mood to tease him or question him about it.

Noting the change in Dean's mood, Sam broke the awkward silence.

"What's wrong, Dean?"

"Nothin'" was the automatic response. Dean never talked about his feelings openly. He'd learned to hide his true feelings behind the mask of fearlessness and sarcasm.

"Right. Nothing got you out of a warm bed with a naked woman." Sam's snide remarks were coming easier and easier: the byproduct of being around Dean for so long.

"Oh, yeah. What's your excuse, bitch?"

"Worried about you, jerk."

Both men grinned, relishing the moment of camaraderie they've come to share over the past two years.

"So, what's really bothering you?" Sam took a swig of his beer to give his brother time to answer.

"I don't know." Dean looked into Sam's eyes, hoping to find the answers he needed to find.

"You do know. You just don't know how to put it into words."

A minute passed before Dean spoke again.

"Well, if you're so smart there, college boy, you tell me what I'm thinking."

"You're nervous about becoming a father. You've got one year left to live, and you know you should be living it up. Instead you're hanging by the side of one woman, the woman who's carrying your child, and you can't figure out why you're doing it at all." Sam stared at Dean, daring him to contradict what he knew to be the truth.

Dean couldn't argue with him. He knew his little brother had hit the nail on the head with every word. He'd changed over the past two years, but this newest development of emotional dedication was unfamiliar territory for Dean. He wasn't sure how to handle it all.

"Well, am I right?"

"Yeah, maybe."

The silence once again became heavy with unspoken words. Sam couldn't stand it any longer and had to ask.

"What happened to Alyssa in the bathroom at the restaurant?"

"I don't know really. She said I did it to her." Dean hadn't gone any further in discussing the how's and why's of the beating he supposedly inflicted upon her, mostly because he didn't believe he could ever hurt Alyssa. There was no way he would let her come to any harm, especially by his own hand.

"You beat her? How did you do that to her? Why?" Sam knew his brother had a temper. Rage burned in Dean just below the surface of the carefully built façade of control and cool, but he'd never hit a woman first.

"She had a vision of it, but I would never do that to her."

"I know, Dean. But what if it's some kind of influence that drives you to do it? Her recent visions have been about this Jedidiah guy and what he did to his wife and stepdaughter. Maybe you come under his influence somehow."

Dean thought for a moment. It was the only theory that made any sense. If he was affected by a really pissed off spirit, then it was possible for him to be driven to beat the only woman he truly cared about.

"It's not going to happen, Sam. There's no way I'm going to lay a hand on her. I'll kill anyone or anything that does. But it won't be me that hurts her."

With that said, the conversation seemed to be over, leaving the two brothers to finish their beers and order a second. Neither of them was ready to leave just yet.

Sam could see a particularly busty blonde had been eyeing Dean the entire time they'd been sitting in the bar.

"Don't look now, but you've been targeted." Sam set his beer on the table.

"By what?" Dean was stiffening, not sure if there was a threat nearby.

"A blonde." Sam sneered at his brother.

"Oh. I thought you meant there was something here. Don't do that, dude."

"Here she comes." Sam tried to hide in plain sight so the blonde wouldn't head in his direction.

"You two aren't from around here, are you?" The voice was thick with booze and lust.

Dean ventured a look at the voice's owner and noticed she was just his type. Her long blonde hair was straight from a bottle. Her lips were full and painted red, the same red as her tight leather tank top that seemed to strain as it tried to hold all of her in.

Sam fully expected his brother to openly flirt with the voluptuous babe standing provocatively at their table.

"No, we're not." Dean answered without the usual lustful intentions in his own voice.

"Well, you need a tour of the town, now don't you? I can give you a personal tour if you like?" Her blue eyes sparkled with the hope of a night with one of the handsome men who graced the small bar.

"No thanks. We're finding our way around just fine." Dean turned towards his brother looking for help to rid them of her.

Sam couldn't believe what he was seeing and hearing. His brother was turning down a blatantly obvious chance to bed a strange woman; something his brother had done numerous times during their travels around the country.

"Right, Sam?" Dean again silently urged his brother to help him out.

Sam cleared his throat. "Right. We're fine. Our wives are sleeping, and we just came here for a couple of beers."

"Oh," the blonde seemed to pout with the rejection. "Well, if you get bored, I'll be around." She bounced off with hope that her invitation would be accepted in the near future.

"What has gotten into you, Dean?"

"What?" Dean acted as if his behavior was completely normal.

"You just turned down a roll in the hay." Sam leaned in towards his brother, hoping he could see further into Dean's mind.

"I know. It's weird." He finished the beer, and got up to leave. "You ready?"

"What's the rush?" Sam polished off his own beer and rushed to catch up to Dean as he headed for the door.

"I don't want to leave her alone for too long. You know, in case she has another vision." Dean stuck his hands in his jeans pockets to warm them against the cold winter air.

"Yeah, good thought." Sam knew his brother had changed over the last two years, but this was something he never expected to see Dean become, committed.

"See you in the morning, Sam." Dean slid the key card through the lock mechanism and listened for the click. His hand slowly turned the knob, pushing the door open.

"See you, Dean." Sam was already making his way into his room, still in disbelief of the night's developments.

The darkness of the room hid the terror that flooded her mind. Alyssa was trapped within her own dream, fighting against a nightmare that threatened to consume her soul.

The sky seemed to be on fire. Black clouds billowed across a breathing red sky as if it were smoke. Lightning flashed briefly illuminating the world around them revealing an abandoned town.

The dirt and gravel streets of the desolate town were muddy from recent rains. There were no street signs, no building markers, nothing to tell her where they were.

Her lungs burned as she gulped the hot dry air, trying desperately to feed more oxygen into her over-exerted limbs, silently pleading with her legs to keep running. Dean ran beside her, keeping pace relatively easily. They each gripped their guns in their right hands, looking back for the thing that was chasing them.

Dean turned to the right, guiding her towards what used to be the center of the town. She could see a landmark of some kind growing larger as they neared it.

"Wait," he breathed heavily, slowing their pace, "maybe we lost them."

Alyssa stopped with him, leaning against a well, trying to catch her breath. She took the break to study their surroundings, committing them to memory. There was something significant about this place, so knowing what she was looking at was extremely important.

Another lightning bolt crossed the sky, giving her a glimpse of the object they leaned against. Over the well hung a large brass bell engraved with a tree.

'Remember', she told herself.

The menacing growling of large dogs interrupted their brief respite.

Both of their right arms shot out, guns in hand, pointing at the approaching sounds. Another flash of lightning shot across the sky, bringing into view a large cloud of dust heading their way.

"Come on!" Alyssa started pulling on Dean's arms, leading him away from the sounds.

"I can't outrun them anymore," Dean lowered his gun, looking at his feet, giving up. He'd fought long enough, and it was time to let go and give her and their son a chance at a normal life. "My time is up, Alyssa. Sam's alive, and I have to pay up. It's over."

"No. I'm not giving up. Not now. Sam needs you. Your son needs you. I need you." She grabbed his face in her free hand, forcing him to turn his head. "We can make it. Look."

Dean's precious Impala waited for them. Its headlights were on, as if anticipating their arrival. The engine was idling, promising them escape, if only they could make it.

They were close enough to the car to see a face in the lightning. That face belonged to their son, who crawled around in the car, waiting for his parents to return. Their future was in the Impala. Their only way out of this was to get to the car, to their son, and drive away from all of this.

"We can't give up!" Alyssa screamed over the thunder roaring through the air. "We're so close. Just a little further, Dean!"

The light of life seemed to fill his eyes once again. Her heart swelled for him, wanting him to never leave her. She knew he would fight to the very end, and she would be right there with him fighting just as hard.

"Let's go!" Dean led the way this time, but Alyssa kept up with him.

Growling, snarling, sounds of nails digging into the gravel and dirt grew louder behind them. She could feel the heat of the hellhounds' putrid breath on her back. They were gaining on them; they were coming to collect their due.

Alyssa chanced a look over her right shoulder as she ran. She knew only those who were being collected were supposed to be able see them, but somehow she could see them. Panic rose in her throat at the sight of four hellhounds bearing down on them, hell bent to catch them, literally.

The hounds were much larger than wolves. Their fur was black as night, hellfire smoke rolling off of them as they hunted their prey. Nails as long as eagle talons shredded the earth beneath them with each stride. Red eyes bobbed up and down with the rhythm of their pursuit.

She stretched her right arm back, never missing a beat in her flight, and pulled the trigger. The shot echoed through the night, hitting its target. A pair of eyes disappeared, but there were still three more, and there was certainly no guarantee another wouldn't show up to take the dead one's place.

'How did I kill a hellhound with a gun?' the thought was there, lingering in the background of the fear and desire to escape. As far as she knew, there was no way to kill a hellhound. Dean wasn't questioning it, so she accepted it for now and kept running.

Lightning danced across the black clouds, allowing them brief glimpses of the world around them, but the two hunters only had their sights set on one thing: the Impala.

The car grew closer as they made progress. Alyssa knew they would make it. They had to make it. Failure was not an option here. Dean would be with her. He would be free of his deal if, no when, they made it to the car.

The feeling of relief and renewed hope washed over her as she and Dean nearly collided with the car. Her hands found the warmth of the hood comforting and the purring of the engine much like a lullaby.

Their son, J.D., was inside the car. He was calm as if the world around him wasn't bubbling with fire and brimstone, seemingly unaware of the evil hunting his parents.

Alyssa tried to open the door of the car, but to her horror, the Impala was locked, the keys in the ignition. Dean looked across the top of the car with the same look of dread and disbelief. They had come so far, gotten this close, just to be stopped by the locks of a car door.

She laid her left hand on the window, her gun hand below the car door, so as not to scare her son. "Open the door for Mommy," she spoke unhurriedly, hoping not to frighten him.

Alyssa could see her son's eyes, green like his father's, staring at her. His smile at seeing her warmed her heart; lending to the hope they could be free of this world.

"Open the door, kiddo. Pull the lock up." Dean was doing his best to stay as calm as he could, knowing any sign of fear would be picked up by his son.

The world around them went dead silent. No thunder, no lightning, no growls, just silence. Dean and Alyssa searched the darkness for what they could feel was out there, hiding, hunting, ready to strike.

"SONUVABITCH!"

Alyssa snapped her attention across the car where Dean had been but a second before. She bolted around the hood. "Dean!" He had been dragged to the ground by the hellhound gripping his boot in its yellow-stained teeth, dripping with drool. His fingers dug into the ground, not releasing the earth, trying to keep himself from being taken away.

"NO!" Alyssa dove through the air and was able to grab Dean's arm. She pulled her to him as her own arms wrapped around his torso, gripping him with all the strength in her body.

Dean's large hands gripped her arms, pulling at her skin. But she ignored the pain, knowing his life was what mattered. As he used her body weight to fight the teeth that grabbed at his feet, she squeezed off a round into the face of the hound. It, like the first one, disappeared giving her the opportunity to pull Dean free.

She held him against her body, her back braced against the driver side door of the Impala, her gun hand aiming into the blackness, searching for the next target.

Dean breathed heavily against her, groaning in pain.

Alyssa lowered her gun, her mind now set on finding what was causing him so much agony. She reached beyond him, pulling his jeans above his boots.

He inhaled sharply as the material was dragged across his bloodied legs. Alyssa saw the deep gashes in his calves, bleeding freely. She had to get him out of here and fast. Dean would either be taken by the hellhounds or bleed to death from the wounds.

"Dean, get up." She struggled to get him into a seated position.

"Damn! I can't move my legs."

"Yes, you can. Now get up!" She pushed him off of her and started to reach for the door handle of the car. The absence of his weight on her legs snapped her attention back to him.

"Alyssa!"

She could only stare in disbelief as Dean was once again ripped away from her, only this time it had been so quick, she hadn't had time to react.

"Dean!" She screamed as she watched him disappear into the darkness, the red eyes of the hellhound who had taken him boring into her soul. She knew she would lose him this time.

Her heart shattered with failure. She couldn't save him. She had tried her hardest to keep him with her, but she had let him down, and let him die. All that was left of him now was his voice yelling her name over and over again. Tears streamed down her face as he heard him in the night, still calling to her. She felt no shame in crying for her loss now. Not only did she lose him, now her son would no longer have a father.

Her son. She remembered he was in the car. Had he seen the horrible spectacle of his father being pulled into the pits of hell? She could only imagine what his young innocent mind must be thinking.

She got to her feet, feeling the weight of her own disappointment in herself weighing her down. What would she tell her son? What would she tell Sam? Bobby? She didn't even want to think of facing Bobby with the knowledge that she had been unable to save Dean.

To her amazement, her son still seemed unafraid.

'Maybe he didn't see anything. Oh, please, let him be blind to all of this.' She begged her inner self.

"Unlock the door for Mommy, J.D." Her voice so did not match the sorrow welling within her soul. She tried to keep an upbeat, carefree air about her so as not to scare her son, but inside she was dying, second by second she felt as if she were losing her grip on her own sanity.

Alyssa waited for her son to unlock the door to the Impala. Once she was inside, she would grab him up in her arms and never let him go. He was all she had left of Dean now.

The young child in the car with his father's green eyes, dark blonde hair, and the same smile that could melt her heart was all she had left in this world to remind her of the man who had stolen her heart when she was fourteen years old.

J.D. had crawled into the front seat of the car, holding the steering wheel for balance. He wasn't seeing his mother. There was something behind her that had drawn his attention.

Alyssa noticed the look of fear on J.D.'s face, but she didn't have time to turn around and face the thing that had frightened her son before her legs were swept out from under her.

"NO! You have him! It was his debt! Not mine!" The skin on her legs shredded apart as the nails of the hellhound dug in to keep her from escaping. She could feel her own blood, warm and wet, soaking through her jeans. Her feet no longer responded to her demands to kick, the tendons having been severed.

The eyes of the demon dog were blazing with red fury, the smoke of its fur streaming off into the night air. Its teeth were embedded into her skin. She aimed her gun, and pulled the trigger, but the click of the empty chamber was all she heard. She was out of bullets. There was no escape. Her son would be left in this nightmare of a world, alone and terrified.

She craned her neck to look up into the driver's side window. Her son's small fingers were unlocking the door, but it was too late. The last thing she did see, through the tears blurring her vision, was her son. His lips mouthed "mommy", and then he was gone.

Her body shook as the beast dragged her across the ground. Dean's voice was still calling her name through the darkness.

'How could he still be alive?' was her final thought as the darkness swallowed her.


	11. Chapter 11

**Chapter Eleven**

She gasped for air as the dream evaporated in her mind. Dean was calling her name, shaking her shoulders.

"Alyssa, wake up!" Dean stopped jolting her when he saw her eyes snap open.

"Dean?" He was here. Alive. She whipped her head around and realized she was still in the motel room, in a bed, safe and sound. There was no town, no clouds of smoke, no lightning, no Impala, no hellhounds.

She threw the blankets off of her legs, seeing nothing there. There was no blood. There were no long gashes made by teeth and claws.

She moved up on the bed, inspecting him for any sign of injuries. The memory was still fresh in her mind of him being ripped from her arms. Her heart was slowly realizing he was there, her hands really touching him.

Dean let her get up and look him over. Her hands searched him, but he didn't know for what.

"It was a nightmare?" Alyssa couldn't understand how she could have been caught up in such a horrible dream and not know it was only the work of her subconscious mind.

"Yeah, it was one hell of a nightmare, too. I couldn't wake you up." He could see the fear and horror in her eyes. "What was it, Alyssa?"

She didn't know what to tell him. What if it wasn't just a normal dream, but a prophetic dream? Alyssa had never been the one who had prophetic dreams. That had been one of her grandmother's many gifts, one that was not passed on to her. At least, that's what she thought. Her visions of the future came in waking moments, not during her sleep. She was a dream walker, one who had the ability to step into other people's dreams.

"What the hell was it?" Dean asked once again, his eyes telling her he wasn't letting this go. Her stubbornness with giving up information was really starting to annoy him. Either she gives it up or I'm beating it out of her, he thought.

Alyssa couldn't look into his eyes. The horror of what she had seen in her mind settled deep within her heart.

"I…I lost you."

"What do you mean 'you lost me'?"

Alyssa wasn't sure she should say any more.

"It was just a dream. I'm fine now." She hoped he would let it go and got up from the bed signifying she didn't want to explain it any further.

"Oh, no way. Don't walk away from me and say nothing!" Dean stood his ground, next to the bed, his hands rolled into straining fists.

Alyssa halted halfway between the bathroom and the bed, her body still shaking from the remnants of the dream.

"Don't ask, Dean. Please." She quietly pleaded.

"Why? The dream was about me, right? And what do you mean you lost me?" Dean wanted to know. He knew she had visions, and maybe this one was a vision, something to do with him. "I deserve to know if it's about me."

"What if I don't want to remember the dream, Dean? Don't I get a say in this?" she looked back over her shoulder to see what his face would say. She could read his body language better than his words.

"No. You don't." He said flatly.

She had lost this argument before it truly got started. Alyssa closed her eyes, wanting to erase the images from her memory, but no matter how hard she tried, she couldn't get them out of her head.

"Fine." She sat back down on the bed, her legs still not quite sure if this was reality. Alyssa knew how to explain situations to people without emotions. It kept her from getting too involved on the job and also kept people safe. Almost instinctively, she put the wall around her emotions and locked them away. The conversation was just about the facts.

"We were in a town, some deserted old western town. I don't know where, but there was a well. It had a bell with a tree engraved on it."

Dean's heart stopped, knowing full well of where she was speaking. It was Cold Oak, South Dakota. The place the demon had taken the psychic children to battle it out for the top spot. It was the same place Sam had died and where his life had begun its downward spiral.

"We were running from hellhounds, you and me both. We'd almost made it to the car, but the doors were locked. I was able to shoot a couple of the hounds, but not before you were taken away." Just hearing the words coming from her own mouth brought her on the edge of a complete breakdown. She could feel the panic and helplessness threatening to overthrow the solid reserve she had practiced so many times to maintain the distance required to do the job.

"So, do you think it was a vision of some kind? A look into what's going to happen to me?" Dean was empty inside. He hadn't really thought about the actual method of his being taken to Hell or what it would be like. Hearing it spoken plain as day made it all the more real.

"I'm not sure, Dean." The emotions had returned to her speech, making her human once again. "In my family, it was my grandmother who had the dreams of the future, not me. Maybe it's just my own…" She halted in mid-sentence, not sure of how to put her thoughts into words.

"Your own what?"

"My own fears of what will happen to you and the thought that I might be there to see it happen." She still couldn't bring herself to the point of telling him how she really felt about him. Unrequited love was her destiny, it seemed.

"So don't be there." Dean hardened himself. He didn't want her to be a witness to the end of his life. He didn't even want Sam there, but he also knew he wouldn't be able to keep his brother away with an army of men. But he certainly did not want Alyssa there to watch him die. "We'll do this job, and then me and Sam will take off." Dean walked to the window, not wanting her to see just how much it hurt to tell her to leave him.

"So, you're the one leaving now? I seem to remember the "we all stick together no matter what" speech being ranted at me a couple of times." Alyssa gripped her own hands tightly, forcing herself to stay calm, in control, and not to cry as she sat on the bed staring at his back.

"This is different. I'm not a hunt."

"Right. We're just supposed to let you go. No fight. No struggle. Just drop you off on Hell's doorstep with a note attached to you. 'Good luck with this one. We love him, but he's a major pain in the ass.'" Alyssa abruptly left Dean standing at the window as she stormed off into the bathroom. She'd lost the war against the tide of sadness and other unfamiliar feelings tormenting her.

Her dream scared Dean to the very core of his being. If her dream were a premonition of what his demise would be like, he'd rather take a bullet to the head, quick and simple.

Resigning himself to keeping this all from Sam, he settled down in the bed and waited for Alyssa to return from the bathroom. They already had something to deal with so her nightmare was going to have to stay on the backburner. It was time to get back to work and kill that son of a bitch spirit who was responsible for beating on Alyssa.

She stood in the bathroom, the lights revealing the damage to her face. But she didn't see the cuts and bruises. She only saw the haunted look in her eyes and the tears streaming down her face, falling into the sink below her.

She'd just found him again. She'd pretty much told him, more like showed him, how she felt about him, and now, she'd seen him torn from her life, torn from her son's life. There was nothing she could do in the dream to keep him safe, and if it were a prophetic dream, then there would be nothing anyone could do to keep him from going to hell. And the end of his life was not going to be pretty, or painless.

Knowing he was most likely waiting for her to return to bed, Alyssa cleaned herself up as much as her injuries would allow her and straightened her back, ready to face him again. She would take this on as she did if it were any other case, with the strength and courage of a hunter. And if she went down with him, she would go down fighting at his side.

Alyssa opened the bathroom door and turned off the light. Dean was in the bed, as she knew he would be with his back turned to her as he lay on his left side. She joined him, throwing the blankets over her and laid a hand on his back.

Dean turned over to her as he felt her skin touch his, the warm water rushing through him again. He used to think it was strange to feel her like that, but now he'd come to expect it, and want it.

They didn't speak a word, as they both lay in the bed, wide-awake, wrapped in each other's arms. No words could be said, only the fear and trepidation of knowing what the future held for one of them. They lay together for another hour before sleep finally found them both, allowing them a dreamless slumber.

Alyssa's eye was blackening, but the swelling of her lip had gone down. Sarah helped her cover the darkening bruise with make-up. She even offered to do the rest of Alyssa's face, but the sisterly bonding thing wasn't Alyssa's cup of tea. She politely declined being made-up and prepared for the day's tasks, gathering the supplies she would need to stop the visions assaulting her and the death that haunted the house.

Sam had made a phone call to the realtor's office to arrange to see the house, unescorted. Apparently the house's reputation had the other agents spooked, so they were more than happy to let them see it on their own. They were expected to stop by the office and pick up the keys whenever they were ready.

Dean packed a duffel bag with rock salt rounds, two shotguns, matches, and lighter fluid. His and Sam's assignment was to find the bones of Jedidiah and burn them. Sam had suggested they find the bones of everyone and burn them, but Alyssa knew the only threat was the father.

The other two spirits, the mother and daughter, had tried to stop him from hurting the people who moved into the house. They just weren't strong enough to stop him when they were alive, and that weakness had transcended to the afterlife. Now they were trapped within the house, unable to leave, as punishment for defying Jedidiah.

The plan was simple. Alyssa and Sarah would go in the house and keep Jedidiah busy and distracted. Alyssa was to trap Jedidiah in the house with a protection circle so he couldn't get out and influence the guys. Sam and Dean would head out to the back of the property to find the graves using a map they'd retrieved from the local library.

In the event of their deaths, Jedidiah had arranged for him and his family to be buried on the property. He wasn't much for spending money on anyone but himself and his sons, and he knew it would be cheaper to stay on the property, alive or dead.

The house didn't look menacing in the daylight, but Alyssa knew that looks were definitely deceiving in this case. Sam gave her the keys. The four of them stood together in front of the house waiting for something to happen.

"Stay out of here okay, guys," Alyssa reiterated the warning. "No matter what you hear, you don't go in. We'll be safer with you two out here," she turned to Sarah. "Are you ready?"

"Yep," Sarah was nervous. She was a little more involved in this than she was comfortable with. Sam hugged her to reassure her that things would be fine.

Dean brushed a finger across the cut on Alyssa's lip. "I'm going to burn that bastard before he lays another hand on you."

"Just make sure you do, and make it fast," she remembered the look on his face in her vision, the vision in which she received the black eye from him.

The look in his eyes had frightened her more than anything she had ever faced. He seemed a different man full of hate and rage. She never wanted to see that look in real life. And if one mistake was made by any of them, she just might.

They broke off into their teams, the guys headed off to find the family cemetery, and the girls made their way into the house.

"This feels so wrong," Dean carried his shovel over his shoulder.

"I know," Sam was responsible for carrying the duffel with the salt, matches, and fuel. "We need to do this as fast as possible, okay?"

"Yup." Dean had the map of the property and guided them to the cemetery. "Crap."

"What? This is it, right?" They stood before five mounds that time had almost succeeding in erasing.

"Yeah, this is it. But which one is he?" There were no grave markers. The passage of time and erosion by the elements had obliterated any indications of whose grave was whose. They would have to dig up all of them.

Sam tried to call Alyssa to let her know things had become complicated, but he couldn't get through.

"No signal," he sounded worried as he pocketed his phone once again.

"EMF could be blocking it," Dean didn't want to sound worried, but his eyes betrayed him to his brother.

"Should we call it quits and get them out of there?" Sam was ready to turn tail and go.

"No. We need to get this over with. I'm not letting him put one more ethereal hand on her. Pick one." Dean took the first digging shift.


	12. Chapter 12

**Chapter Twelve**

Inside the house, the sun shone through the curtains, just like in her vision. Chills ran up Alyssa's spine, settling in the back of her neck. The place looked just like it had in her mind.

"You okay?" Sarah was standing next to Alyssa not wanting to leave her side for a second.

"Yeah, I'm fine. Just a little nudge from the ghosts around here. That's all," Alyssa didn't want to scare Sarah too much. She needed her here to help keep Jedidiah busy while the boys did their job. "Ready?"

"I guess," she tried to sound as strong as Alyssa.

"Let's go." They headed into the kitchen, where Alyssa had seen the plumber attack the realtor.

Whatever blood had been on the floor was cleaned up. There seemed to be some residual essence in the room, but nothing major. Could be the girl or the mother, she wasn't sure.

She checked her compass watch and noted that she was facing west. They needed to face north first and start there. Alyssa walked back to the living room and placed a brown candle and a handful of dirt under the window. Sarah followed her.

"Put the yellow candle and the incense in that room facing that way," she pointed east. Light them when you get them set." She bent down to light her own candle

Something crashed upstairs. It sounded like glass breaking, maybe a picture or a mirror. Sarah came running back into the front room, wide-eyed and scared.

Alyssa looked toward the staircase and kept her cool.

"Don't worry. It's normal to hear things falling. The spirits are letting us know they know we're here and what we're up to," Alyssa returned to lighting the candle. She walked to the candle and incense Sarah had lit and said a prayer over them.

She motioned for Sarah to follow her to the back of the house.

Under the staircase was another room. Alyssa knew this had been Jedidiah's den of sorts. This room was his sanctuary, and no one else was allowed in here. During the most recent remodeling, Jedidiah's space had been refurbished to be a sunroom.

Glass windows encompassed the area giving a view of the backside of the property. Wicker furniture made it cheerful and inviting.

Alyssa could see the guys out in the back about a hundred yards out. They were still digging. Hurry up, Dean, she thought to herself.

The air in the sunroom had grown colder. Sarah could see her breath, and Alyssa could feel someone else was in the room.

She slowly turned from the window to look behind her and Sarah. She could see him, Jedidiah, glaring at her. She could feel his anger at her being here in his sacred space. His face was twisted in disgust at the women who dared defy him.

"Sarah," she whispered, "put the candle and matches on the floor, and very slowly step back out of the room." She was reaching into the duffel bag for the shotgun loaded with rock salt rounds.

"Why?" Sarah turned to see what had captured Alyssa's gaze and held her breath at seeing the apparition. "I'm not leaving you, Alyssa," she whispered in return.

"You're either very brave, Sarah, or extremely stupid. But I'm betting on the brave. Take the blue candle and the holy water and place them in the kitchen on the counter. Yell when you've lit it, okay."

"Is it safe to leave you here with it?" Sarah set the red candle and a couple of matches on the floor at her feet.

"He's not looking at you, right now. So go on and don't leave the house unless there is no alternative. Do not go outside and do not let the guys inside," she kept her eye and the gun trained on Jedidiah as Sarah left the room. The door slammed cracking the wooden frame.

Alyssa held the shotgun steadily aimed at Jedidiah's apparition.

"Nice to finally meet you, Jedidiah." She pulled the trigger, allowing the kickback to take her arm up. Jedidiah's spiritual form dissolved as the salt round hit him.

Sarah got out of the room just as the door shut harshly behind her sending splinters of wood flying past her. She heard the shotgun go off, jumping at the sound.

Alyssa told her she had to get the candle lit in the kitchen. Just as she had come around the corner to the kitchen, Sarah came face-to-face with a teenage girl.

Please don't let her have a razor blade, she silently prayed.

Looking closer at the beautiful child, Sarah could see the rope marks around her neck. This was the spirit of Maddie, the girl who had killed herself.

She lightly stepped around the ghost not wanting to touch her and made her way to the kitchen counter. As she made ready to light the blue candle, Maddie appeared next to her. Her mouth was open to speak, but no sound came through. The candle was lit.

"It's ready Alyssa!" she yelled back. The girl's spirit seemed upset and promptly vanished. Sarah jumped at seeing the girl disappear so quickly. I don't think I'll ever get used to that, she thought.

Alyssa heard Sarah call out the candle was lit. She had lit the red one just after she'd shot at Jedidiah.

As she readied herself to empower her circle, Jedidiah reformed before her, angrier than he was before she'd plugged him with rock salt.

She hated everything about this man, when he was alive and now that he was dead.

His prim and proper dress of the early twentieth century did little to hide the evil that dwelled within him. He was a monster and deserved nothing in the way of forgiveness for his travesties against his wife and stepdaughter.

Alyssa didn't usually get emotionally involved on her hunts, but this one had become personal. She reached up to her face feeling the bruise on her cheekbone.

"You got your one good shot in, Jedidiah. Now it's my turn," she stood defiantly in the middle of the sunroom. She could feel each candle burning; each element called forth, her circle of power had been created.

Dean and Sam heard the shotgun go off, and they knew Alyssa had found Jedidiah. There was silence after the first shot.

They had finished digging up the second body when they felt the earth move beneath them.

"What the…?" Dean looked back at the house.

"I don't know. Feels like Alyssa," the hairs on his arms were standing straight up and he felt like he'd just been punched in the pit of his stomach.

"Is she okay?" Why couldn't he feel anything? As if it heard him, his skin responded with needles running up and down his arms. That's better, I think.

"Not sure. Couldn't even begin to guess what that was," he threw the shovel off to the side and climbed out of the hole. "Second body, maybe we'll get lucky," he poured the lighter fluid and salt on the bones.

Dean took his turn to salt and fuel the bones he'd dug up earlier. Together they lit the matches and threw them in the holes. Twin fires burned, scattering the souls of two members of Jedidiah's family. Dean and Sam hoped one of them was Jedidiah himself. They would have to wait and see before digging again.

Jedidiah was still standing before her. She glanced over her shoulder to see the two fires burning in the distance. They'd gotten the wrong graves. Try again, guys, please, she thought.

She looked back to Jedidiah, raising the shotgun for another crack at him, but he had vanished. She quickly expanded the circumference of the circle enlarging it to encompass the entire house making sure he couldn't escape now that she had control.

She could feel the two female spirits. They were screaming for her to help them. She ran for the door, pulling with all her might to open it.

"Sarah! Sarah! Can you hear me?" she pounded on the door.

"Alyssa, are you okay?" Sarah had run from the kitchen.

"Sarah, push against the door while I pull! I need to get out of here!"

Sarah pushed as hard as she could while Alyssa pulled. Inch by inch the door released its death grip and finally opened.

"Thanks," Alyssa moved past Sarah. "You haven't gone outside have you?"

"No. I stayed inside just like you said. I saw the girl, Alyssa. I saw Maddie."

"Where? Did she show you anything, say anything?" Alyssa headed to the staircase, reloading the spent shotgun barrel with another rock salt round.

"No, she just seemed really upset when I lit the candle in the kitchen." Sarah followed her wondering what was going to happen next.

"Damn. Where did he go?"

"What do you mean? He disappeared?" She moved a bit closer to Alyssa looking around her hoping he didn't materialize anywhere near her.

"He can't leave the house. The circle keeps him in and keeps other stuff out. Of course, I don't think he wants to leave. He wants someone to come in." Alyssa had an idea who his special visitor was to be.

"What do we do?" Sarah really wanted Sam here right now. He'd know what to do. Not that Alyssa didn't, she just wanted his strong arms around her to protect her.

"I go upstairs. You stay down here," she started up the stairs.

"Alyssa, I thought we were to stay together. As a team," she didn't want to be in the house alone.

"We are a team, Sarah. If this goes to crap, you're the only person who can get me out of this."

"What do I do?" she had to be strong for Alyssa. She and the baby depended on her now.

"You'll know when to come get me. Don't let the guys in, no matter what, okay?" Alyssa headed up the staircase. She was nervous, but knew she couldn't show fear. Jedidiah fed off of the fear of women.

The first door on the right at the top of the stairs was open. She knew it was Maddie's room. The new bed and curtains couldn't remove the stench of death emanating from the room.

Alyssa stepped into the room and felt herself pulled to another time. It shifted to the past, when it had been Maddie's room. The bed was made of iron, the mattress dirty and sunken in the center.

It was as if she were watching a television show as she saw the young girl coming into the room. She was smiling and holding the necklace her mother had given her. It had been a happy birthday for her. She sat on the edge of the bed looking at the beautiful locket and the pictures of her and her mother it held.

Her stepbrothers burst into the room loud and obnoxious. They had been drinking with their father again. Since they were the men in the family, and they could go wherever they wanted, she wasn't allowed to tell them to leave her room.

The boys were talking about how it was her birthday, and they had a present for her. The larger brother grabbed her by her hair and pulled her down on the bed. He told her not to move, and she knew she had to obey. The other boy lay on top of her, telling her they were going to show her what it was like to be a woman.

Alyssa watched the past replay for her as the boys raped and beat Maddie, each taking his turn at her. When they were done, they left her broken and bleeding on the bed. Maddie cried for what seemed like hours. She could barely move, but she summoned her strength and lifted the mattress of her bed revealing her hidden treasure, a rope.

She and her mother had planned on Maddie escaping one night through the window using the rope and never returning. But Maddie had another use for the rope, tying it to the ceiling beam over her bed. She tied the other end around her neck and stepped off the bed railing. In her hand, she held the broken chain to her mother's gift.

The scene before her faded into the present. The room changed from dark and dingy to light and airy. Jedidiah stood in the doorway, smiling.

Alyssa wasted no time, raised the shotgun, and blasted another salt round through the ethereal form. Once again, Jedidiah dissipated, but he'd be back, and angrier than before.

Alyssa left the room heading to the right for the next door. This one was larger. It had been Jedidiah's sons' room. Again, the room changed from light to dark.

The boys were asleep in their beds, satisfied with having shown their sister her place in the family.

Maddie's mother came into the room, lifting the rifle, pointing it at the larger of the boys. The shot echoed through the room, even though it was only a vision of the past. The younger boy woke up to the sound, only to be shot dead like his brother. The vision ended, returning the room to the fresh beige paint job.

Alyssa left the room, chills attacking her body as the ghosts of the dead touched her.

The room at the end of the floor was massive. It had been remodeled to include its own master bathroom.

Jedidiah was reconstituting himself quickly, which meant he was a very powerful spirit, stronger than she'd initially given him credit. He stood near the window that looked out on the field behind the house. His malicious grin spread across his face, his eyes full of anger and hate.

Sam and Dean had just begun digging the third hole when they heard the second shotgun blast from the house.

There was another short span of silence before the explosion rocked through the air. They hit the ground as they had been trained to by their father.

"Alyssa," Dean jumped back up to see the house was still standing, but it was windowless. Every piece of glass in the house had shattered.

"I don't think that was her, Dean."

"You stay here. Finish digging. And torch that son of a bitch," Dean was running for the house.

"Dean! You can't go in the house!" Sam knew this was bad, but they weren't supposed to go anywhere near the house. He resumed his digging with more fervor desperate to end this before it could get worse.

"I know!" he yelled back. He cursed as he ran towards the house, and said a silent prayer that Alyssa was still alive.


	13. Chapter 13

**Chapter Thirteen**

Sarah had ducked behind the staircase when the house started shaking. Once the glass and dust had settled, she emerged to survey the damage seeing shattered glass everywhere around her.

Beyond the humming in her ears from the explosion, she could hear Dean yelling for Alyssa. It was her job to stop him before he made into the house.

"Alyssa!" He took the steps to the porch two at a time. "Sarah!"

She met him at the door, stopping him from bursting into the house. "Dean, you can't come in. She said I can't leave and you can't come in. The circle has to stay intact," she coughed through the dust.

"Are you two okay?" He couldn't see Alyssa.

"I'm fine. She went upstairs after Jedidiah. She told me to get her if things got bad. Have they gotten bad, Dean?"

"Yeah, this is bad. Go get her," He resisted the urge to run up the stairs and get her himself.

"Okay. Wait here." She ran up the stairs, probably not as fast as Dean could have, but she made it.

Dean watched as Sarah disappeared up the staircase. The wait was killing him. He should be up there bringing her to safety. What seemed like an eternity later, he heard footsteps running down the staircase and was horrified to see Sarah alone.

"Dean, I…I don't know what to do. I can't find her. It's like she's gone," she stammered, eyes wide with shock.

"Are the candles still burning?" Dean was itching to move.

"What?" Sarah blinked.

"Are the candles still burning and the elements still there? Focus, Sarah."

She looked below the window where Alyssa had lit the brown candle and left the dirt. "They're gone," she pointed to the empty space.

"Get back to Sam. Help him dig up those bodies," he moved past Sarah before she could protest.

Dean sprinted up the stairs, not knowing where he was going. He ran from room to room searching for her. He found her in the master bedroom, but she wasn't alone.

Jedidiah had her by her throat, lifting her off the ground. When he turned to see the man who entered his home, the smile on his face turned Dean's blood cold. He released Alyssa, letting her fall to the floor, and promptly disappeared.

"Alyssa," Dean ran to her, lifting her head gingerly from the floor, afraid to move until he knew she was conscious.

She stirred at the sound of his voice, following it out of the darkness that once again tried to take her. But something was wrong. Dean wasn't supposed to be here. He shouldn't be in the house at all.

"What are you doing in here? I told you not to come in here!" Her eyes were filled with fear. Damn him, she thought.

"C'mon." Dean lifted her up onto her feet, coughing through the dust.

"Dean, you have to get out of the house. Now!" Alyssa found her balance and was now leading the way down the stairs, pulling Dean with her.

The suddenness of the stop nearly wrenched her shoulder out of its socket. Dean had her hand in his, but he wasn't moving any further towards the door. Alyssa looked back seeing the muscle in his jaw twitching with bottled up anger, and his green eyes had darkened.

'Oh no,' she whimpered to herself. Jedidiah had found a winner: a man full of unspoken pain and unbridled rage.

"I'm sick and tired of you telling me what to do," he growled.

"Dean, we have to leave the house. Once we're outside, you can yell at me all you want, I promise." Alyssa pleaded with him.

"No, I want to stay in the house." Dean held her arm tightly, pinching her skin between his fingers.

"I want to leave the house," she ignored the pain in her arm and tried to pull free of him, but the impact of his hand across her face sent her reeling into the wall behind her.

"Shut up!" Dean left her against the wall, cradling her face. He paced the floor in front of her, seething. "I'm sick of everyone telling me what to do! Dad! Sam! Bobby! Now you!" He turned to her, his eyes dark green with rage.

"What the hell are you talking about?" Alyssa remained against the wall, fighting the urge to hit him back. She had to remember he wasn't at fault here. Jedidiah was using Dean to do his dirty work.

"Dad told me what to do, where to go, who to hunt. I was his perfect little soldier. Sam tells me where to drive, what jobs to do; it's almost like being with Dad again. And Bobby does the same thing. I feel like I'm surrounded by my Dad."

"And just what have I contributed to this moment of self-pity?" She knew she should tread carefully with him, but she worked more on her instincts than logic.

Dean's rage crashed against his mind, wanting out. His body responded with another blow to Alyssa's cheek, this time drawing blood. Somewhere deep in his heart, he knew it was wrong of him to hit her, but he just couldn't help himself.

"I didn't want a kid. I never even thought about having a kid. And suddenly you get pregnant, and now I'm supposed to be a father. No one asked me if I wanted it." His voice grew angrier at each word.

"You know how it happened, Dean. It wasn't my fault or yours. It just happened. And I never expected you to be anything you weren't ready to be." She had to keep him talking to give her time to think of a way to help him and save herself.

Dean seemed to move like a cat as his hands wrapped around Alyssa's throat, pressing her harder into the wall. His eyes bored into hers, looking for something, anything that would satisfy his need to dominate and control her.

"You don't get it do you," he spoke low and menacingly. "I get to decide what to do with my life. Why do you think I made the deal? It's the only time I've made my own damned decision. I chose, only me. That's how it's supposed to be." He held her tighter, wanting her to feel pain and fear.

Sarah had finally reached Sam.

"Sarah, where's Dean?"

"He went in the house to find Alyssa. She just disappeared, Sam." She was breathless and scared out of her mind.

The news his brother might be in trouble spurred him on to dig faster and harder. He had to find the body. He just hoped Dean and Alyssa could hold on a little while longer.

Alyssa struggled against the pressure on her throat, fighting for every little bit of air she could get.

"He's mine, Jedidiah! You can't have him!" She yelled to the house.

"I belong to no one, Alyssa," Dean spat back at her. "You don't own me. Sam doesn't own me. Dad doesn't own me."

"I may not own you, Dean, but you are mine. You always have been. I marked you years ago. Think back to my birthday and the hunt for the banshee. Remember that?" Alyssa looked beyond his eyes, the eyes of a man full of hate, and saw Dean, the real Dean, as if he were waiting behind the rage.

She had to reach him, the part of Dean that was still there, the part that still cared for her.

"Remember," she whispered. Air was becoming harder and harder to get into her lungs, drawing the darkness closer and closer to her. She didn't have much more time to stop Jedidiah from taking Dean to his side completely.

Dean was there, in his body, but it seemed as if he wasn't really there. It couldn't be his hand holding Alyssa so tight that she could barely breathe. It wasn't him who hit her hard enough to slam into a wall. Ignoring the urges to continue hurting her, he did as she commanded him; he thought back to the night they'd hunted the Banshee.

It wasn't the actual hunt he remembered but the time after that, the time he was the first man to make her a woman. Something extraordinary, almost supernatural, had happened during that time. He remembered the moment they reached their peak together. The air around them had changed; it seemed to shimmer. He originally thought it was just his imagination, but now he believed it had been her, her untapped power awakening.

She had marked him with that power. That was why it had taken him so long to get her out of his mind, out of his system. She'd left a piece of her in him somewhere.

One more shovel full of dirt and Sam was there. He could see the old wooden coffin. He slammed the shovel into the coffin splitting it open, revealing the bones within.

The skeleton was dressed in a suit. The remnants of a hat and boots could be seen. This had to be Jedidiah. He hopped out of the grave tossing the shovel aside.

Sarah had the lighter fluid open and ready. She handed Sam the fuel and she took the salt. Together they drenched the remains. Sam lit the match, looking back at the house.

Hope they're ready, he thought as he threw the match into the grave and watched the bones burst into flames.

Alyssa had to do something and soon. Sam had to be close to burning the remains by now.

Dean's hand tightened even more around Alyssa's throat. Jedidiah was desperately trying to keep a hold on Dean, making sure she knew who was really in control.

Alyssa fought off the blackness, trying to stay conscious enough to get through to Dean. She could still see Dean's eyes glaring at her, but now they weren't the green she'd come to love. They were the familiar sickly brown she'd seen in her visions. Jedidiah had somehow seeped into Dean. His voice had changed, too, taking on an accent of someone from the Deep South.

"That bitch I married thought she could deny me my sons. I will have my sons returned to me starting with yours, and I will teach you to be a proper wife. And when you give me a daughter, she will learn her place, my way." He hit her again, splitting her lip.

Fighting the stars that threatened to drown her vision, she growled through the blood in her mouth. "You will have nothing, Jedidiah. No family, no sons, no wife. The man you're in now is mine. Get out!" Alyssa concentrated on forcing Jedidiah out of Dean's body.

He only needed to be out for a split second for the vanquishing to happen. Sam had lit the bones; she could feel it. Alyssa placed her hand on Dean's chest feeling his heartbeat.

She split her consciousness the way she did when dream walking, sending her astral self into Dean's subconscious mind.

She found him in the darkest recesses of his mind, swallowed by the violence of Jedidiah. Dean's life, his heartaches, his losses had built up walls to enclose the rage, never letting it out, but now it was flowing around him, free to be used against whomever stood in its path. It only tightened the hold Jedidiah had on Dean, and he wasn't about to let go easily.

Alyssa linked herself to Dean, tethering him with her gift. She had to get him to the forefront of his physical body and help him force out the consciousness that was Jedidiah. She wasn't sure how she was going to do it, so she let her gift guide her.

Dean felt her pulling him, wanting him to come with her. He followed the sensations that sent the needles coursing through him, knowing it was Alyssa. He wanted to be with her, wanted to feel her taking him, and wanted her to save him. She was the only thing that mattered. By letting her save him, he was saving her as well.

His eyes turned green once again, his face a mask of fear and concern at seeing the damage to her face and how his hand was wrapped around her throat. She smiled at him, doing her best to let him know she could see him again as she passed out in his arms.

Jedidiah appeared behind Dean, glaring down at the two people who had beaten him at his own game. The pure hatred he felt for the woman could be plainly seen and felt, and yet he was able to enjoy one last moment of victory as he saw the woman dying before him.

Dean looked over his shoulder, seeing Jedidiah's spirit hovering just above them.

"Nice try, bastard. Beaten by a woman. Pretty big blow to the ego, huh?" Dean grinned with satisfaction as he watched Jedidiah disintegrate in a ball of flames.

Sam and Sarah had set the bones to burning and ran back to the house not waiting to see the remains become ashes.

The house looked as if a bomb had exploded inside. Glass and dust were scattered everywhere. In the middle of the disaster zone, Sam and a breathless Sarah came upon Dean kneeling before the still body of Alyssa.

"Sam, help me." Dean didn't dare touch her anymore than he had already. His hands did this to her. He had sworn to himself, sworn it to Sam, and even told Alyssa it wouldn't happen, but it had. He had tried to kill her.

Sam dialed the local 911 operators and reported the emergency and address. He put his phone away and scooped Alyssa into his arms.

It was as if they'd already lost her as the three people filed out of the house speaking no words amongst them. No more spirits haunted the home. Future owners would be safe from the violent spirit that once dwelled within its walls.

But the cost may have been too high. Sam's eyes misted over with tears as he held Alyssa close to him.

"Alyssa, please wake up," he begged her. He sat down on the front steps with her in his lap to wait for the ambulance to arrive. "C'mon, Alyssa. You're stronger than this. You can't give up now." He wiped her sweat-soaked hair off her face, taking note of her black eye, the cuts on her lip and cheek. It looked like she'd gone a few rounds with a heavyweight-boxing champ.

"Dean," the whisper was barely there, but they all heard it.

"He's fine. He's right here." Sam looked at his brother.

The desperation in his face was evident. He wiped his hand down his face, erasing the traces of the tears that had fallen. Always the hard one of the duo, he didn't want to let her see him as worried as he truly was. The stronger he could be for her, the stronger she would be for him.

She turned her head slightly to get him in her sights. Mustering all her strength, she held her hand out to him, a small smile making its way across her lips.

He took her hand in his, the faintest of warmth passing between them, and squeezed it to let her know what he couldn't say with words, for he felt there were no words to convey just how sorry he was for hurting her.

"Hey. You did it. Jedidiah's gone. The docs are coming to take you to the hospital. Stick around a little longer, okay?"

She knew instinctively what he was trying to say in his touch. She managed to swallow past her damaged esophagus enough to whisper, "You owe me." And then she was out once again.


	14. Chapter 14

**Chapter Fourteen**

They watched as the doctors and nurses worked like a well-oiled machine. Lines in, oxygen on, test this, test that, BP levels, a lot of medical mumbo-jumbo. Dean and Sam stared through the little windows of the trauma room doors.

Dean held his head in his hand, leaning against the door, watching them work to bring Alyssa back around.

"It's just like watching Dad again."

"She'll pull through, Dean," he clamped his brother on the shoulder reassuringly. "She's a fighter. She wouldn't go down without making sure someone took the ride with her."

"That's not what I'm talking about," he continued to watch Alyssa's face under the oxygen mask. "I was to blame for Dad's death. And now, if she…." He couldn't finish the sentence, "I put her there, Sam. I did this to her."

Sam pulled him away from the window and out of earshot of the other people milling around the emergency room. "You didn't put her in there, Dean," he hissed. "It wasn't you." He stared intently into his brother's eyes, willing him to believe him.

"Are you sure? I hit her. It was my hand around her throat," he shrugged Sam's hands off and went back to watching the trauma room, hoping for signs of progress that meant she would be okay.

"Dean, you can't do this to yourself. It wasn't you. Jedidiah wanted to hurt her. He wanted to do that to her," he pointed at the room. "Not you."

"But it was my anger he used to do it. I've been so pissed at the world, at Dad, at you, at my life, at everything for so long, and I don't know how to stop. That's what that bastard used to hurt her. He may have been the one who pushed the buttons, but I let him. I didn't fight back hard enough to protect her," tears stung the corners of his eyes. "I didn't fight back because I liked the feeling of letting it all go." Dean blinked through the tears that threatened to betray the wall he'd spent so many years building. He lowered his voice, "Alyssa's in there because I didn't want to control it anymore."

Sam didn't know what to say. He had stood by as Dean began to build those walls early in their lives.

As children, they were always looking to their father for approval, but it was rarely there. They couldn't be normal. They were responsible for learning to shoot at age seven, instead of learning how to ride a bike or throw a baseball.

Growing up it was the same thing. Dad had never been happy, satisfied, or proud of their growth and progress as hunters, or as sons. Dad demanded obedience, no questions or debates. It was his way, and only his way.

When Dean had failed to follow an order or made a mistake, Dad criticized him and let him know of his disappointment, mostly with words that cut deeper than a knife ever could.

To deal with their screwed up life and Dad's constant criticism, Dean shut his anger in, letting it grow and fester until it exploded and someone got hurt.

"Dean," he started to try and ease his brother's sorrow, but what words could he say to make this seem right? What advice could he give him to deal with this? Nothing. He could come up with nothing. He'd never been in this position before, so there was no experience for him to draw from. "She's going to pull out of this, Dean. I know she will." That was all he had for his big brother. Sam abandoned his brother to console a shaken and traumatized Sarah, leaving Dean alone to wallow in his grief and guilt.

The darkness offered sweet release. Alyssa was falling, but she wasn't afraid. She welcomed the comfort of the abyss. No more death, no more fighting, no more fear. It was so peaceful allowing the darkness to take her.

Just as she was about to relinquish complete control of herself to that beckoning blackness, the falling sensation ceased. She could feel the pull of life. There were voices around her, calling her name. Alyssa remembered who was waiting for her, Dean and their son. She had to fight to stay in the world, if not for herself, then for them.

After two hours of working on Alyssa, the doctor in charge of her case told Sam, Dean, and Sarah she was stable, but there had been significant oxygen deprivation, not to mention the damage to the tissues in her throat; she seemed as if she would pull through, however, things were still touch-and-go and would be for the next twenty-four hours. She was being moved to another floor.

Sam breathed a sigh of relief, hugging Sarah. At least she was out of immediate danger, which meant the baby was safe as well. He turned around to say something to Dean, but only caught sight of his back as he walked out the double doors of the hospital emergency room. He knew his brother was heading out to get drunk, and it was best to just let him deal with it on his own. He'd come back when he had finished drowning himself in booze.

It was almost happy hour, but there was nothing to be happy about in his world. Dean soaked his sorrow and guilt in beer after beer.

The bar started to pick up with more patrons looking for a good time on a Friday night. Scantily clad women did their best to entice Dean into a conversation or a sexually charged dance, but to no avail. He politely refused request after request.

One particular blonde wouldn't let it go. She was determined to get the man her friends had deemed a bust. With her low-cut tank top and thigh-high skirt, she was certain she could rein this one in for at least a one-nighter. She approached him again, this time with a little more bounce in her step to accentuate her assets.

"Hey, looks like you need a friend," she bent over the table to give him the view of a lifetime.

"No thanks. Have all the friends I need," he pointed to the beer bottles on his table, hardly taking notice of her blatant display of her deep cleavage.

Undeterred, she continued, "You could always use one more," and seated herself at his table.

"Look, thanks but no thanks," he took another swig of beer, hoping she'd take the obvious hint and leave.

"Not so fast. You don't even know what you could be missing," she moved closer to him, letting him take her all in.

"Yeah, I think I do. And again, no thanks," he chugged the rest of the bottle and got up to leave. He had just made it out the door of the bar when a big, burly biker stopped him with a hand to his chest.

The man's girth was nothing to scoff at. His red beard spread across his face but couldn't hide the long braid of hair resting down his left shoulder.

"You been hittin' on my girl?" his voice was graveled from years of smoking.

"Nope," Dean answered. He was really not in the mood for this. But then again, "she was hitting on me."

"You callin' my girl a whore?" the biker straightened himself up, attempting to use his size to intimidate Dean. He was failing miserably as Dean felt ten-feet tall and bulletproof at the moment.

"He's the one! He was feeling me up at the bar!" the buxom blonde that had failed to take the hint played the part perfectly. She wanted to see a fight.

Dean shook his head knowing what was going to happen next. He wasn't sure why, but what the hell? Here was a chance to test his theory.

"I wouldn't touch her. I have much better taste than that," the bait was set. Let's see if he bites.

And bite he did. Dean wasn't prepared for the force of the right hook that contacted with the left side of his face. It threw him back a good six feet, landing him on his back. He shook it off, trying to clear the stars he'd seen behind his eyes.

Okay, game on, he thought.

Dean knew this guy wouldn't go down easily with a headshot or a kidney punch, so he went lower. Heading in, literally, Dean sent his elbow into the guy's kneecap.

The audible snap of the man's bone echoed off the surrounding buildings. Sure enough, the large biker hit the ground, holding his knee. His screams brought his buddies running from the bar.

Things had just become a bit more complicated, but Dean was game. If he didn't die tonight, he knew the deal was for real.

Dean held his own against the other three bikers, especially since they were considerably smaller. Three unconscious bikers and a possible broken bone or two of his own later, Dean was heading back to the hospital, cradling his arm, wiping the blood from his face. The blonde appeared just behind him, two blocks from the hospital.

"You're a glutton for punishment, aren't you Dean?" He turned to see the same outfit, the same blonde hair, but the eyes were as black as the night.

Figures, face to face with the enemy, and not a drop of holy water in sight, he thought. "It just makes me that much more charming," he retorted.

"Now, why would you take the chance of joining the party downstairs ahead of schedule?" she walked around him, inspecting him, sizing him up.

"Oh, I'm in no hurry. But I figure I should have some fun while I still can."

"Tsk, tsk, Dean. You shouldn't tempt it. We'd be more than happy to take you early," she stepped up to his face, her lips but a breath away from his. "We could have so much fun together. But watching you suffer is much more entertaining." She backed off and continued circling him. "Your girlfriend and your kid on the brink of death, it's driving you to the point of breaking, isn't it? So much fun to watch."

Dean had had enough. He left her standing in the night and headed back to the hospital believing he might need some medical attention himself.

She tried to move her hand, but it was like moving through mud. Her neck felt like it had been bent the wrong way. Her muscles were sore and resisted her efforts to stretch them. She slowly opened her eyes, allowing them time to adjust to the lights. An older, gray-haired male nurse was standing next to her, writing something on a hospital chart.

"Nice to see you awake," he pushed a few buttons on a machine that fed her intravenous line. "Do you want me to wake him?" he whispered as he pointed to her right.

She forced her head to turn, grimacing with the pains that shot up and down her neck to see Dean asleep in a chair, next to her bed.

He looked as though he had been through the ringer a few times. The stitches on his left cheek were surrounded by the many colors of a budding bruise. She looked back at the nurse with a questioning look.

"He came in last night, beat all to hell." The nurse knew she would have questions. "He's got a couple of badly bruised ribs, a sprained wrist, and those stitches. After we treated him, he stayed right there. Hasn't moved a muscle since," he shook his head. "That's some love there."

Alyssa knew Dean had done something stupid to get into a fight. But that was how he dealt with things.

She tried to speak, but nothing came out. She pointed at her throat and motioned that she couldn't talk.

"The ER doctors tried to incubate you, but the damage caused by whoever choked you kept them from getting the tube down. They had to use a smaller tube to get you on a breathing machine for a while. It'll get better and you'll be talking again soon. I'll let the doctor know you're awake," he started to leave.

She grabbed his wrist and pointed at her pregnant belly. Her eyes spoke for her.

"The baby's fine. He's still kicking and the heartbeat is strong. You're both very lucky," he left the room to fetch the doctor.

She couldn't stop staring at Dean. He'd been there all night, at least after he seemed to have taken on a Mack truck. I wonder what the truck looks like? She questioned him in her mind.

She remembered back at the house, the look that was in his eyes before she broke Jedidiah's hold on him. The rage she felt in him was volatile. If it exploded at the wrong time on the wrong person, whoever lay in its path was most certainly dead.

She needed to know what was going on in that thick head of his. She closed her eyes, relaxed her mind and body, the familiar feeling of separating her sub-consciousness running through her, and found him in his dream.

The house was bright, cheerful, and stocked full of family pictures. Alyssa stayed out of view of the kitchen and made her way around the living room.

The pictures on the fireplace mantel were of Sam, Sarah, a small girl, Dean, their mother and father, and someone she didn't expect to see, herself with a little boy. On a bookcase there were photos of fishing trips with Dad, a skiing trip with both of their parents, lots of school pictures, and more photos of her and their son.

The walls were covered with professional portraits of every member of the family, some solo shots, others with the entire family. She stood in front of the portrait of her, Dean, and their son. There she was, just as she stood in the dream, but her hair was longer.

Dean was no different; his green eyes still captured her heart. The little boy in the picture couldn't be more than five. He had his father's eyes and smile. He would grow up to be a heartbreaker, that's for sure. They seemed so happy in the portrait.

"Are you finished with lunch yet, Dean?" A voice came from the back of the house.

"Yeah, on my way!" she heard him yell back. He was placing his dish in the sink and moving the kitchen chair.

She needed to get out of the way before she was discovered. Ducking into the foyer she avoided being seen as Dean walked to the back of the house. She waited until she heard the back door shut and headed upstairs to get a bird's eye view of what the back yard held.

The walls of the stairwell held more pictures of the past, time captured on paper, happier moments from a life that didn't exist, and never would.

She made it up the stairs and found a bedroom with a window looking out on the back of the house. Walking into the room was like stepping into the not too distant past.

The bedroom was an exact duplication of her parent's room in her cabin in Arkansas. Her parent's massive four-poster bed was here, the large bureau, and even the dark red bedding was all the same.

She made her way to the window and standing just out of view of whoever should look her way, she surveyed the scene before her.

It was a family party of at least half a dozen people in the backyard. From the pictures on the walls, she was able to pick out Dean's mother and father. They were on the lounge chairs next to the kidney-shaped pool.

Sam and Sarah were in the pool. Sam had a hold of a small girl no more than three years of age. Her dark hair suggested she was their daughter. Alyssa saw her own dream clone, also in the pool relaxing on an inflatable lounger.

On the grass under the shade of a huge juniper tree, she saw their son. Dean was teaching him to throw a football. His little hands could barely hold the enormous football, but he didn't want to let his daddy down. With all his strength, he threw the ball. It hit Grandpa John in the head. Dean scooped up his son and participated in a game of chase as John did his best to catch the tyke who had hit him with the football.

Everyone was laughing and having a wonderful time. She felt at peace in this dream. This is what Dean's subconscious mind wanted for him. She wished there was some way she could make this dream come true.

Wanting this to never end, Alyssa didn't take notice of the dark clouds heading for the lovely family gathering playing out before her.

But Dean knew they were coming. He started yelling for everyone to get out of the water and head inside. It looked like a storm was coming.

Alyssa finally caught sight of the clouds, but unlike Dean, she knew it was no storm. The screams of the voices within the darkness pierced her soul. This was not going to end well.

She could hear the voices of everyone downstairs saying the children needed to be dried and dressed. Dean and her dream self were coming upstairs to change J.D.

As they reached the threshold of their room, a black mist appeared before them. It didn't see Alyssa hiding behind the bureau, but it did see the dream her and Dean.

Hissing something about payment due, the dark fog assumed a humanoid form; its red eyes glowed menacingly. Dean slowly backed the dream Alyssa out of the room, his arms still clutching their son.

The shape dissipated, giving her the time to move out of this room and see what was to happen next.

Downstairs the family was gathered together in the living room. Mom and Dad were seated on the sofa. Sarah and Sam had gotten cozy in the loveseat with their daughter seated on their knees.

Dean was trying to warn them to get out, to get to safety, but no one was listening to him. They all stared at him as if he was crazy. There was nothing to be afraid of, they all said. Just let it take you. And one by one, each of them, Mom, Dad, Sam, Sarah, and little Breanne screamed and burst into flames.

Dean's heart seemed to stop as his family died before him. He held his son even closer, and then realized the same thing could happen to him. He looked down at his little boy; his green eyes glowed red before he too disappeared in a flash of fire. His hand still held her dream clone's hand, but as he turned towards her, she too was consumed.

He screamed at the top of his lungs that he was supposed to be the one to die, not them.

Alyssa had to let this play out. If she let him know she was here, it could cause problems, problems she didn't want to think about. Another voice could be heard elsewhere in the house. She calmed herself and listened to the exchange between Dean and the mystery voice.

"Why did you take them all?"

"Because we like to watch you suffer, Dean. It's all part of what awaits you," the voice was feminine, but not quite human.

"I don't care what you do to me, just leave what's left of my family alone," he was desperate to end this dream, but he couldn't shake its hold on him.

"But we can't do that, Dean. You left them open to us. You already bartered away your own soul to save your brother. What would you give to save your son?"

'Oh, no you don't.' Alyssa wasn't about to let whatever this was to continue.

It was times like these when it was smart to get involved in a dream. Things could get worse, but the alternatives were unacceptable. She walked down the steps to stand beside Dean facing off with their houseguest.

"Hi, honey. Did you offer our guest something to drink?" she played the host perfectly.

"What? Where did you…?" Dean wasn't sure what had just happened. Alyssa had just disappeared in a flash of flames. How was she here again?

"Come and help me in the kitchen, dear?" she took his hand and led him out of the room. When she figured they were out of earshot of the demon, she got right up in his face. "Dean, you have to wake up right now. This isn't just a normal dream. This could very well be real. And anything you say here could be construed as a binding contract."

"What? What are you talking about?" he stopped his questioning and thought for a minute. He was dreaming. She was a dream walker. She was here in his dream, which meant she was alive. He grabbed her arms roughly, "How did you get in here? Who are you?"

"Dean, damn it! Wake the hell up!" She broke free of his grasp and punched him across the face.

"What the …?" Dean moved too fast as his body reacted to what seemed to be a right hook across his chin. His muscles protested reminding him of the abuse they had endured the night before. He took a moment to get his bearings once again. He was in the hospital, in Alyssa's room, and she seemed to sleeping comfortably.

As he moved around in the chair trying to find a more comfortable position, he vaguely remembered his dream, something about a pool, Mom and Dad, Sam, fire, and a demon. He could see Alyssa in his dream, two Alyssa's. Had she been there? How could she have done it if…? Favoring his right side, Dean maneuvered himself to sit next to her on the hospital bed.

She turned over hoping he wouldn't be too pissed at her for the intrusion into his subconscious mind. He didn't seem to be, just yet.

"Hey, what was that all about?" he rubbed his face as if he could still feel her right hook.

Her throat was still sore, but talking was coming easier. She was up to a loud whisper now. "I could ask the same of you. You have to be careful what you dream and what you say in your dreams."

"What do you mean?" He was still a little groggy from lack of sleep.

"Look at your face," she touched his face ever so lightly so as not to cause him any more pain than she knew it had already. "What did you do?"

"I let off some steam," he played it off as nothing. There was no point in mentioning his run-in with the demon-blonde at the bar.

"On who?" she pressed him for more information. "Should we be looking for uniforms down the hall?"

"Nothing to worry about, okay?"

"Okay, but next time, don't let there be a next time."

"Alyssa," could he find the words to tell her how sorry he was for what he did to her? "I…"

"Don't," she put her hand to his chest. "I know it wasn't you. And don't argue with me about how it was. I get it." She swallowed hard, trying to ease the muscles in her neck. "You're a time bomb waiting to explode. But that wasn't you back there. It was all him. I could tell the difference, okay?" Best just leave it at that, she told herself.

"I still want to say it. I'm sorry," he couldn't shake the feeling there was more to this than she was letting on.

"Apology accepted. Now get me the hell out of this bed." She started to get up, but he stopped her with a hand on her shoulder.

"No way. Doc's orders. You stay put. They want you on bed rest for at least a couple of weeks," he moved off the bed taking with him any chance of her getting help from him.

"Hell no!" she tried to yell, but it came out as more of a raspy groan. "They're not keeping me in here for two friggin' weeks!" There was no way she was sitting here like a bump on a log while they gallivant around hunting and fighting. She didn't want to miss the action.

"Sorry," he held his hands up, surrendering. "Doctor's orders." He could literally see the steam coming from Alyssa's ears. He smirked a bit, thinking, 'Boy is she pissed.


	15. Chapter 15

**Chapter Fifteen**

Sam poked his head in the window of the door, seeing both of them were up and moving around. He could tell Dean had told her she was on strict bed rest from the narrowed angry eyes and crossed arms she displayed. He knocked on the door alerting them to his being there just in case Alyssa decided to start practicing her pitch with the various items within her reach.

"Come in, Sam," she growled.

"Hey, Alyssa. Nice to see you too."

Sarah followed behind him, trying to put on her best smile hiding the fear of what she'd recently witnessed.

"Sorry. It's not you. I'm stuck here for two weeks. I'm just not too thrilled with the idea, okay?"

"I figured you wouldn't be. Dean, can I talk to you outside?" he gave Sarah a peck on the cheek. "Be right back, okay?"

"Sure. I'll keep her company." She also had a problem she needed to discuss with someone, and Alyssa was the closest friend she had right now.

Besides, she knows more about this than I do, she thought.

"Be right back. Stay in the bed," Dean tried to sound confident of his ability to enforce the doctor's orders, but he wasn't sure if he really could.

As soon as they were clear of the door and any possibility of eavesdropping, Dean started the conversation. "What's up?" He took a deep breath. It still hurt, but not as bad as last night.

"I got a call from Bobby."

"What about?" he secretly hoped he would hear of a loophole in his deal, but he seriously doubted it.

"We've got a serious problem," he walked him down the hospital corridor to an outside balcony.

"When don't we?" Dean closed the glass door behind him, taking in the view of the several stories below them.

"Hunters are being murdered." Sam didn't feel this was the time to mince words.

"What do you mean? Murdered by what?"

"Not sure. Bobby's gotten calls from other hunters telling him about the deaths of several hunters. There's no clue as to who's doing it, but it reminds me of another hunter's murder." Sam was referring to his possession by the demon that had possessed Meg. While under her control, Sam had killed a hunter in cold blood, attacking him and slitting his throat in his own home. "And it sounds like it's someone who has intimate knowledge of the whereabouts of hunters."

"You think it might be a hunter possessed like you were?" Dean recalled that time all too well. The search for his brother had driven him nuts. He'd disappeared for a week, without a word, and no way to find him.

And now it seemed there was another hunter-killing demon on the loose. They needed to find it before it wiped them all out, ending any chance they may have had, albeit a slim chance, of winning the war.

Alyssa knew she was being left out of something, and she had a hunch it was another hunt. Dragging her attention from the two men who'd walked out of her room, she focused on Sarah, who seemed to be a bit uncomfortable at the moment.

"Sarah," she wanted to ease her mind, "you did a good job back there. Thanks."

"I thought I screwed up and that's how you got here. I'm not used to this, and I don't know if I could ever get used to it." She sat on the chair next to the hospital bed.

Alyssa could see the pain in her eyes. For her, the last few days had felt like walking through a tornado.

She had arrived under the intention of spending some quality time with Sam, perhaps even developing a relationship that may have stood the test of time. Instead, she was thrust into the truth of their lives, shown the reality behind the shadows, and it didn't seem as if she really were ready for the leap of faith to be with Sam.

"I know it's hard to see what's really out there. These guys have been doing it their whole lives, Sarah. They know this world inside and out. It's something you'll have to consider if you're planning on a serious relationship with Sam."

"I know. It's crazy, all of this. I just don't know if I'm ready for it," Sarah had taken a long time to think about where she fit in, and she realized that right now, she didn't.

"He'll understand, Sarah. Just be honest with him," she could feel the decision had been made. Sarah was going home. She needed to thoroughly examine her life and her feelings for Sam and weigh that against what she would be getting herself into by choosing to stay. It wasn't going to be easy.

To chase away the heavy silence between her and Sarah, Alyssa picked up a remote control and turned on the television in the upper corner of her room.

A special news bulletin had interrupted whatever daytime program had been playing. The pretty young woman on the screen relayed information given to her by the local police department. Apparently the deaths of two more people were hinting at the possibility of there being a serial killer traveling across the country.

Alyssa recognized one of the names of the victims to be a hunter.

She quickly turned off the television as she heard the door knob jiggle with the arrival of the men. Alyssa caught Sarah's eyes, silently warning her to keep quiet about what they had seen on the news. Sarah acknowledged her with a slight nod of her head.

"So, what did we miss?" Sam strode in casually, a fake smile plastered across his face. He was doing everything he could to keep his concerns to himself, knowing full well Alyssa could pick up on the smallest of nuances and read everything into it.

He had no idea he was already too late.

"Nothing. Just girl talk," Sarah stated, keeping to the charade.

"Girl-talk, huh?" Dean was already suspicious. He knew Alyssa didn't do girl-talk.

"I was just telling her she did a good job at the house," Alyssa hadn't lied, just omitted information, again.

Her remark seemed to deflect their radar for the moment. As far as they knew, all was good, and Alyssa had no clue about their new assignment.

Dean stepped up to the side of the bed, readying himself for the battle of wills he was about to embark upon. "We need to get going."

"Great. I'm tired of laying here anyway." She flipped the blankets off and swung her legs over the side of the bed.

"Forget it. It's just Sam and me going this time. Bobby's got a job for us, and we need to leave," he knew she didn't take orders very well, especially when it came to a hunt, but he was going to stand his ground on this one. There was no way he was going to put her in the line of fire of a hunter-killing demon. He glanced at Sam to make sure he was flying as his wingman. He was really going to need the back up on this.

"Hell no! You're not leaving me here in this hospital." She stood up, swaying briefly. Sam moved forward to catch her if she fell. "I'm fine, Sam." She waved him off. "If there's someone out there offing hunters, I'm not sticking around here like a sitting duck."

"How'd you know?" Sam questioned her.

"News report. I knew him, Sam. He helped me on a couple of hunts and was one of my ammo suppliers." She looked around for her clothes. "He didn't deserve to die like that."

"What are you planning then?" Dean walked across the room, retrieved a plastic bag from under the bed, and threw it at her. He wasn't exactly thrilled with her decision to leave, but he knew she was right. Staying in the hospital with no weapons or ways to defend herself was simply suicide.

"I'll go to Bobby's. I'll be on bed-rest there. Between the two of us, we'll be able to watch each other's backs." She pulled her clothes out of the bag and proceeded to the bathroom to change. There was nothing any of them could say to get her to change her mind. Once she decided to do something, neither hell nor high water could stop her.

Sarah waited for Alyssa to disappear into the bathroom before she made her move. Pulling his arm, she directed him towards the door. "Can I talk to you for a moment, Sam?"

Sam shrugged his shoulders at his brother, "Sure," and followed along.

Once in the waiting area, she knew what she wanted to say and there was no easy way to say it. "I think it's best if I go home, Sam."

He knew this was coming. As quiet as she'd been the last couple of days, he just knew she was thinking about the life he led and her place in it.

"I know," he held her hands in his. "It's going to get really dangerous now. And it's not some ghost we're dealing with." He could see the fear in her eyes. "I'll be fine." After all, I've already died once, he thought to himself. He kept his death a secret from Sarah, not wanting to frighten her completely, but someday she would need to know the truth, all of it.

"I just need time. Don't forget me, okay?" She stood as tall as she could on her tiptoes to kiss him, her tears running over his hands as he held her face, returning her kiss.

Dean and Alyssa waited in the Impala while Sam escorted Sarah to her flight home. He had noticed she hadn't spoken the whole trip to the airport. As a matter of fact, she hadn't said a word since they'd agreed she would stay at Bobby's while they went after the hunter-killing demon.

"You okay?" Dean asked her, looking across the car at her in the passenger seat.

Her mind was busy thinking of what they were up against. The demon that was killing hunters was going to be difficult to track down, let alone trap, and exorcise.

"Yeah. I'm fine. Just worried." She didn't feel up to discussing what was really on her mind. She was about to be separated from Dean once again, and no one knew for how long. A demon was killing hunters, and she was a target as well as Sam and Dean, and even Bobby.

Thoughts of how she felt about all of the men in her life flooded her mind. She argued with herself as to whether or not to tell Dean her true feelings. One part of her told her she should spill it all; let him know how she felt. The other part of her told her she shouldn't say a thing; because it could jeopardize the delicate relationship they had now. Why fix what isn't broken?

But something in Dean was broken, broken enough to draw to him something violent and destructive. And whatever it was in her that had made her the target of his rage must also be damaged as well, but she had no idea what it could possibly be. After all, her whole life had been nothing but one catastrophe after another.

She felt a kick from within her belly; her son reminding her he was there. Knowing her son was but a few months from entering the world, the miracle that he was, should have calmed her and given her hope. Instead, a deep fear for the safety of her son dug into the pit of her stomach and latched onto her heart. Words she never thought she'd think echoed through her mind: 'This will be the last.' She wasn't sure where the thought had come from, if it was her own thought, or what did this being the last mean. Alyssa knew the answers would come to her when they were meant to come, not before, but the wait could very well kill her.

Sam returned to the car, quiet and subdued. He was mourning the loss of yet another woman to his cursed life, but he knew the most important job right now was saving his brother. Of course, that had to be put on the back burner so they could go after a demon that thought a killing spree was a great vacation. He hopped in the back seat and settled in for the long drive to South Dakota.

Dean pulled the Impala into the junkyard just as the sun was breaking through the clouds on the eastern horizon. Sam and Alyssa had slept for the past four hundred miles or so, forcing him to be alone with his own thoughts. He had revisited his past, remembering the good times, the bad times, and everything in-between.

He went over the events of the present, the now, his deal, the war, Alyssa, his son, and the enormity of it all pressed upon his mind. What awaited him in the future? At this point, not much, he told himself. So what did that mean for Alyssa and their son? He ran his palm down his face desperately trying to erase the sorrow eating away at his soul.

He had to stay strong for everyone, put on a brave face to show he wasn't afraid of the destiny he chose for himself. This was his decision to make, and he made it. That was final, he told himself.

"Sam. Alyssa. Wake up. We're here," he shoved his brother to rouse him.

Alyssa woke up, feeling the ache in her back again from trying to get comfortable in the back seat of the Impala.

"Okay, I'm up," Sam rubbed the sleep from his eyes, stepped out of the car into the morning light, and opened the rear door for Alyssa. They both followed Dean trying their best to wake up.

Bobby was expecting them and, once again, he greeted them with shots of holy water.

"Bobby, you know I have the tattoo, and the guys are wearing the charms you gave them. There's no need for this." Alyssa didn't feel insulted, but she was very concerned for Bobby's safety and mental well-being. After all, his friends were being ripped apart by a demon that could be after him too.

"Just to be on the safe side, okay? Nothing personal." He'd explained.

"You know, if you keep this up, this kid's going to end up glowing in the dark from this stuff," Alyssa chugged her shot, wishing it was whiskey.

"I'm surprised I'm not glowing already," Dean quipped in response, but he too downed his shot.

"Here, here." Sam added and swallowed his shot glass full of holy water.

Satisfied no one was possessed, Bobby let the three hunters into his home.

"Alyssa will stay here with you, Bobby. She's supposed to be on bed rest, doctor's orders, but you see how well that went over."

"No one can keep her still. I tried, once. And that was the last time." Bobby shook is head trying to chase away that particular memory. "Doctor's orders, huh? What the hell happened?" He looked Alyssa over, noting the bruising by her eye, the crappy stitch job on her cheek, and the cut in her lip. "What does the other guy look like?"

Alyssa couldn't answer. There had been no other to fight, only her on the receiving end of the beating.

Dean answered for her, "He's dead."

"Yup. Expected as much." Bobby headed off to the kitchen to get some beers for the boys and a soda for Alyssa.

Alyssa looked at Dean, silently thanking him for stepping in and covering both their butts. She headed upstairs to her old room without another word. Her back ached and she still hadn't fully recovered from the encounter with Jedidiah.

"Hey, Bobby. Where's Ellen?" Sam was looking over the huge map on the wall of the dining area. It was stabbed through with a half a dozen red tacks, marking specific locations spread out across the country.

"Jo showed up a few days after Ellen called her. They got into a big argument and took off to who knows where. Where's Alyssa?" He held the two beers out for Dean and Sam, but still held the soda in his other hand.

"She's kind of beat right now." He cocked his head towards the stairwell.

"Oh," he set the soda on the table. "So, you want to tell me what really happened to her?"

"What do you mean?" Dean tried to play it off. He opened his beer, chugging

"I mean, she didn't answer me when I asked what the other guy looked like. She didn't even look me in the eye. I know my girl, boys. Something deep went on down there, and I want to know what it was." Bobby sat down at the table, expecting Dean and Sam to follow suit and fess up what they knew.

"Long story short," Dean began as he sat down across from the older man, "Jedidiah got a hold of me and used me to beat the crap out of her."

Bobby eyed Dean to make sure he was telling the truth. Satisfied that he was, he began, "So, that's why you're still in one piece. Boy, that girl's got it deep for you."

"Got what for me?" He chugged a large swallow of his beer. Dean had had his suspicions, and he and Alyssa had briefly touched on the subject of feelings, but somehow other issues always seemed to sidetrack the conversation between them.

"Are you really that dense, Dean? The only reason you're still standing isn't because the spirit was controlling you. If you were anyone else but you, she'd have knocked you on your ass, beat the living hell out of you, and then gotten the spirit out of you."

"So what are you saying exactly?" Dean was growing more and more nervous as Bobby continued.

"Guess you really are that dense." And he left the conversation at that. Bobby retrieved a folder from his cluttered desk and laid it on the table in front of Sam.

"What's this?" he opened the folder to reveal several recent newspaper clippings about the murders of men and women.

"The demon's victims. All hunters."

"Wait a minute. Are you saying she really is in love with me?" Dean had thought about it for just a second, dismissed the notion, and then finally realized Bobby was onto something.

"Took you long enough." Sam jumped in. He'd known months, maybe even years ago.

"You knew, too?" Dean glared at his brother as if this was something he should have been told from the beginning.

"I knew back in Arizona." Sam returned his attention to the file and the tacks on the map.

"And no one told me."

"Figured you knew and you were just playing your usual games." Sam rifled through the pages, noting the attacks matched the locations on the map.

"She was into you back in high school, Dean." Bobby glared at the Winchester, daring him to say something derogatory about his daughter.

"Yeah. I know." He smirked to himself, remembering her eighteenth birthday. He saw Bobby's narrowed eyes and quickly put the memory away and straightened up.

"Dean, I swear to you, if you hurt her, I'll beat the crap out of you myself." Bobby's final words on the subject had hit home.

"Got it." Dean concentrated on looking through the articles with Sam, leaving the discussions of the heart for another time.

Alyssa slept a dreamless sleep. She awoke to the sound of her own breathing and the mumblings of the men in the front of the house.

"Is there a pattern to these murders, Bobby," Sam asked still reading the articles.

"Doesn't seem to be," he answered, looking at the map on the wall. The red thumbtacks were splayed out across the states. "What are you thinking, Sam?"

"Well, it seems that whoever's doing the killings is moving west. How many more hunters are there between here and the last murder?"

"Hunters are scattered all over, but I personally know of one," he got up from his chair and laid a finger on the map, pointing at Iowa. "He's a good friend and a decent hunter. You think he's next?" Bobby remembered the man to whom he owed a lot.

"Then you two should go and help him, if he needs it," Alyssa emerged from the stairwell, eyeing the map tacked with dead hunters.

"Hey, girl. You have a nice nap?" Bobby pulled out a chair for her.

"Yeah, I guess." She accepted the seat. "If hunters are in danger, we need to help them as much as we can. We're all that stands between the demons and humanity. If this person is in danger, he needs to be warned."

"And you want me and Sam to go and take care of it?" Dean was seeing Alyssa in a whole new light since the confirmation of her feelings for him. Every eye movement, every look into his eyes became a telltale sign of her emotions.

Despite how she felt, she was literally sacrificing him and his brother, even though she wanted nothing more than to keep them both here and protect them as much as she could.

"Yes. I'll stay here with Bobby and get the trap set up again. If you can lure the demon here, we should be able to catch it and exorcise it." Alyssa noticed Dean was staring at her more than usual. Something had gone on while she'd been asleep, but it wasn't as important as getting to the lone hunter and warning him of the impending danger.

"You boys better gear up and make sure you have buckets of holy water. This thing won't go down without a fight. From the looks of what it leaves behind, it's not playing nice." Bobby warned.

The Impala was loaded up with supplies, and Dean and Sam were ready to head out to Iowa.

Bobby gave Sam the hunter's name and address, as well as directions to his home. "Chester Rowland usually has his place wired, so be careful. He's a suspicious man, and he has a damned good reason to be."

"Why's that?" Sam asked, taking the paper with the name and address written on it.

"If or when you can get him to follow, make sure you grab his son. James is in his late teens now, but he's a hard-ass, like his dad. Probably won't go without raising a little hell of his own."

"We'll grab them both, Bobby. Thanks." Sam got in the Impala and waited for Dean.

Bobby walked back into the house as Dean and Alyssa were coming out. He was carrying a duffel bag, heavy with bottles of holy water.

"Come back alive, Dean." Tears threatened the corners of her eyes, but she fought them back with her usual diligence. "And no more deals."

"Right. No deals. Don't think I have anything left to bargain with anyway." He threw the duffel in the back seat of the car. "Just promise me you'll stay here with Bobby. No following us."

"Me? Follow?" she smirked at him the way he always did to her, but the look in his green eyes begged her for agreement, sobering the moment. "No following you. I promise. Be careful." She made to leave him and head back into the house, but his hand wrapping around her arm stopped her.

Dean had seen the flash of something in her eyes when she'd told him to be careful. It was what he'd seen so many times before, but he'd never paid it much mind. Now he knew what that look was, and it felt good to know someone cared more about him than just the next roll in the hay.

"Wait up for me," was all he could think of to say.

"Bet on it."

The Impala pulled out of the junkyard, heading east.

"Take care of them old girl," she spoke to the black car. "Bring them home." Alyssa went inside the house, let Bobby take her in his arms, and she finally let herself fall apart. She gave herself permission to cry, at last.


	16. Chapter 16

**Chapter Sixteen**

Sam navigated them across the states, keeping the conversation strictly business-related. He knew his brother didn't like to talk about emotions, so he had kept his observations to himself.

"What's going on in that freaky head of yours?" Dean broke the silence.

"Nothing." Sam wasn't taking the bait.

"Bitch."

"Jerk." Sam grinned.

"Something's on your mind, Sam. I can see it."

"It's nothing, really." He still wasn't sure how to approach the subject of Alyssa.

"C'mon. Spill it." The drive was going to be long and boring if they didn't talk. And he knew Sam had something on his mind that was bothering him.

"It's just you and Alyssa." That was all he wanted to say for right now. He was hoping Dean would step up and take the conversation further.

"What about me and Alyssa?" Here comes the lecture, he thought.

"Nothing. Never mind." Sam could feel the tension in the car thicken. Dean didn't want to hear what he thought, which was perfectly normal.

"Go ahead, Sam. Let's here your side of it." Dean secretly wanted to hear what his little brother had to say about the subject but felt obligated to continue the charade of not really caring. After all, his brother knew him well enough to know he'd put up a fight on the talk, so he didn't want to disappoint him.

"Okay. How do you feel about her? You know her feelings, but she doesn't know yours."

"Boy, no beating around the bush or anything, huh?"

"You asked."

"Right." Dean took a moment to find the words. "I don't know, Sam. It's weird knowing how she feels about me. I can't look at her the same anymore."

"Is that a bad thing?"

"No. I don't think so. I…" he still couldn't figure out how to explain it. "It's not like we can settle down, get married, raise the kid, and be normal."

"She didn't ask you to do that, did she?"

"No. But it's almost like I'm supposed to now." He built up his courage to say what came out next. "Alyssa's been considering adopting him out to a family who can protect him."

Sam was stunned. The thought of his nephew living with another family had never crossed his mind. He assumed Alyssa would stop hunting and raise her miracle child, but apparently Alyssa had planned on continuing life on the road.

"Why? I don't get it. I thought all she ever wanted was a kid. Why wouldn't she want to raise him?"

"Normal isn't a part of us, Sam. Any of us. She can't see herself giving up hunting and being able to make it home to him. I know how she feels." Dean stared off at the black top ahead of them.

This life was lonely, unrewarding, and just downright dangerous. Raising a family in this world usually got someone killed. Dean thought of his own parents, Jo's father, Isaac, and the many others they'd lost to the battles with the supernatural. And now with the Demon War upon them, there was no safety to be found anywhere.

"So, she's just going to give him up to strangers and trust they'll protect him from what's out there?"

"She hasn't made the final decision yet. I asked her not to."

"Why would you stop her from making that choice?"

"I don't know. I just feel it's not something she should rush into." Dean was getting uncomfortable with the direction the talk was going.

"There's not much time left until the kid is born, Dean. She's going to need to make a choice soon."

"I know."

"What does this have to do with how you feel about her though?" He knew the conversation had been steered away from Dean early on, but he let his brother talk. It was a rare occasion, and Sam wanted to get as much as he could out of him.

"Doesn't matter what I feel. There's nothing I can do for her. Remember, I'm not going to be around for very long."

"Dean, I already told you. I'm going to do whatever I have to do to get you out of that deal. And I know Alyssa's going to do the same. And Bobby. We're not letting you go." Sam's voiced slowly raised as spoke.

"My own personal army, huh?" Dean smiled.

"Damn right. But you still haven't said anything about how you feel about Alyssa. You're avoiding the subject."

"I just don't know, Sam. I don't know what to think, what to say, what I'm supposed to say, or nothing." Dean refused to use the word 'feel' because as far as he was concerned, he just didn't feel at all. That's how he survived this way of life. He'd tried to feel once, and Cassie burned him for it. Once was enough for him.

"Well, she deserves to know. As soon as you figure it out." Sam ended the conversation with that, leaving the rest for his brother to contemplate.

Barnes City, Iowa, was nothing more than a spot off the side of the road. Blink once, and it was gone in a flash. In the middle of the night the town seemed deserted but for the one blinking red light in the center of town.

The Winchesters stood before the fortress, listening to the emptiness of the night. There were no sounds, no bugs, and no frogs, not even the wind whispering through the dying leaves. The silence itself was deafening.

Dean suspected he and his brother were being watched as they contemplated their next move. He pointed to each corner of the seven-foot tall wooden fence, showing Sam the positions of the cameras tuned into their current location. Sam nodded his acknowledgement of the technology before them. He, too, knew they were in a very precarious position.

They had to get into the house to protect the father and son, but they also needed to let the men inside know they were not the enemy. Before either of them could suggest possible scenarios, a voice boomed through the trees.

"Who are you and what do you want?" The voice demanded angrily.

"Avon calling!" Dean shouted, smirking at Sam.

"Dean!" Sam smacked Dean on the shoulder and growled at him, wondering why he was always looking for trouble.

"One last time! Who are you and what do you want?" The voice boomed again, becoming more irritated with the two unwanted visitors.

Sam stepped up to the camera, "I'm Sam. This is my brother Dean," he paused after the introductions, wondering if this hunter, too, had heard of them. Apparently the news of the Hell's Gate fiasco had spread across the country, and they were the only two in the world everyone seemed to blame for it. Sam hoped this hunter was more receptive to their explanation of what really happened. Getting no response, Sam continued, "Bobby Singer sent us." He figured it was time to throw down some names.

There was a moment of silence, as the person on the other end of the speakers considered this bit of news. "Why are you here?"

Dean was fed up with the niceties and took his turn at the helm. "Bobby sent us because there's a demon on the loose using us for target practice. It's moving west, and you and your son are next in line."

Sam meant to give Dean a nasty look, but he realized his brother was right. They didn't have the time to play as if all was right with the world, because things were not right with the world, not by a long shot.

"How do I know you're not this demon you claim is killing hunters?" The voice asked.

Sam too felt the frustration of the situation setting him on edge. "Mr. Rowland, we need to get inside and help protect you and your son. And if we're lucky, we can catch this demon and destroy it before it destroys any more of us. Test us if you want. Just make it quick."

Sam's speech seemed to do it. The lock on the gate unlatched and opened remotely. Dean made his way back to the Impala, admiring his brother for stepping up to the plate and taking control. He was becoming more confident that his brother was going to be okay after he was gone.

Dean pulled the Impala into the driveway and ended up parking grill to grill with an older model SUV that looked as though it belonged in a redneck nightmare. Large Halogen spotlights lined the top of the red cab. Fog lamps dotted the bottom of the grill that was modeled after the mouth of some ravenous shark. Huge mud tires coated with the dried up evidence of having traveled across some part of an unpaved area stuck out like the shoulders of a giant.

Sam and Dean closed the car doors and heard the familiar clicking of guns being readied for use. Simultaneously, both boys raised their hands to show they were carrying no weapons and waited for their test.

From the shadows lining the house, a young man stepped out, his shotgun steadily trained on Dean. His father, almost an exact clone of the son, stealthily made his way from the darkness of the carport, his pistol aimed directly at Sam's head. Both of the Rowland men sported the same short, military hair cut and wore fatigues most likely purchased from an old army supply store.

"It's the welcoming committee. I feel so warm inside." Dean smarted off as he stared down the teenager in front of him.

"Wouldn't be so cool 'bout havin' this in my face if I were you." The kid was calm, steady, and seemed to have the situation well under control.

"Well, you're not me, and be thankful you're not."

"Dean, stop it." Sam held the attention of the older of the two men. "So, you're Bobby's friend, Chester Rowland." He looked to the young man holding his brother at gunpoint. "And you must be James."

"And what if we are?" The older man had been diligent at keeping himself in shape. His bulging, muscular arms were tensed with the strain of making sure he was prepared to pull the trigger should it become necessary to protect himself and his son.

"I'm in the mood for a shot of Holy Water. Got any?" Dean held his hand out for the bottle he knew one of them carried.

Chester slowly reached inside his army jacket, pulled out a silver flask, and tossed it to Sam, never taking his glaring eyes off this stranger who dared to show up and claim to be hunters.

Sam unscrewed the cap, wiped off the mouthpiece with his sleeve, and tossed back a swig of the salty water. He swallowed as he handed the flask to Dean and made sure his brother did the same.

Dean finished taking his swallow of Holy Water and handed the flask back to his brother. Sam screwed the cap on the bottle and waited for someone to make the next move.

"Dad, they're not sizzlin'" James became a bit nervous, realizing the two strangers might be telling the truth.

"I know." Chester lowered his pistol and looked to his son to do the same. He held his hand out to Sam. "I'd like to say it's a pleasure to meet you, but I don' think you come here with good tidin's."

Sam took the offered hand and shook it firmly. "I wish we had better news as well, Mr. Rowland."

"Call me Chester. And you two must be John Winchester's boys, right?"

Sam and Dean looked at each other, knowing their father's reputation had preceded them.

"You two have quite a bit to explain." Chester led the way into the ranch house by way of the front porch. He swung open the screen door and waited for his son to enter followed by their guests. Before he closed the door behind himself, he pressed the button on the garage door opener clipped to his pants pocket and watched the gate creak back into place.

James had turned on the lights as he'd entered the house, revealing to Dean and Sam the layout of the Rowland home. The front room was homey, inviting, decorated in a country living style, but scattered amongst the wooden ducks, the lace doilies, and the crocheted throws were stacks of books, bags of rock salt, talismans, and amulets.

Words of different languages, but mostly Latin, were painted on the walls, windowsills, and doorframes. Dean felt as though he had stepped into the Dark Ages. He half-expected an old crone to step from behind the wall and tell him his fortune with the bones of a dragon.

"Nice place." Sam spoke low, not sure if they would take it as the compliment it was meant to be or as a sarcastic remark. He wasn't as good at the sarcasm as his brother, but he was working on it.

"It works." The older man motioned for the boys to take a seat on the couch as he and his son took the matching brown recliners opposite them. "So, what the hell happened? Why the hell did you two open Hell's Gate? And you mentioned something about a demon killing hunters, so start talking."

Sam started off, with Dean interjecting when he felt he should, and the story played out for the Rowlands.

Alyssa had showered and dressed to refresh herself after having emotionally collapsed in Bobby's arms. She hadn't spoken a word; she'd just cried until she couldn't cry anymore. Bobby had asked her over and over again what was wrong, but she hadn't had the strength to put everything into words, and now, she knew he was waiting for her to emerge from the bathroom with the answers to his questions.

She had never opened up to anyone in her life. The last time she had tried to tell all her secrets, it had ended in disaster before it had even started. She'd wanted so much to tell her mother about her gifts, what she could do, what she could hear and see, but the night of her tenth birthday had been the end of her young, innocent life, and the beginning of a new life: a life she'd never dreamed for herself.

Alyssa finished combing through her long hair and braided it into a single ponytail down her back, tying it off. She took a deep breath and opened the bathroom door to finally let it all out.

Bobby was waiting for her at the dining table. He'd never been more frightened than when he'd held Alyssa in his arms as she simply fell apart. He knew there were some deep scars inside her, but he couldn't possibly imagine what could have left so much damage as to nearly tear her inside out.

After what seemed an eternity, she finally made her way from the bathroom to the dining table beside him. Even though it was late at night, she hadn't dressed for bed, knowing they could be in for a battle that could last the whole night and into the morning. Bobby knew she'd want to be prepared for anything, and fighting evil in a nightgown wasn't going to be very effective.

He could see she just didn't know how to start, so he took the first step.

"You care about Dean a lot, don't you?" He waited to see if she'd shut down again or finally take advantage of an open hand.

"I never really thought I did. At least, not as much as I realize I do now."

"What does that mean? As far back as I can remember, you always seemed a bit different around him. More competitive than usual, and always wanting to be around him."

"I was hoping to impress him. You know, show him I could handle myself. Beat him at his own games, without showing him up and damaging his swollen ego."

"But now?" Bobby chuckled, thinking back to all the times Dean and Alyssa had gone head-to-head on the firing range, tried to outdo each other in spur-of-the-moment archery competitions, and even gone as far as to repeatedly take each other on in hand-to-hand combat. He'd thought she was trying to put Dean in his place and prove to him a woman could do the job just as well, if not better, than a man. Her tactics seemed to have worked, as Dean respected her more than any other female hunters they'd come across.

"After everything we've been through, Bobby, and now the baby, I just don't know if I can go on with this life, knowing someone else is depending on me to take care of him. And with Dean's deal, it makes it so much harder." She was on the verge of breaking down again.

Bobby took her hand in his, "Alyssa, we're going to find a way for Dean to get out of the deal. He's not going anywhere. He'll be here for my grandson to be born, and he'll be here to watch him grow up. We're not letting him go without one hell of a fight."

"I know, Bobby, but I just feel as though Dean's given up. And I don't know if I want to spend the time and energy when it feels like we're beating a dead horse." She tried with all her might to shove her emotions down into the abyss where they'd been all these years, but this time, they weren't going down without leaving something behind.

Bobby could tell she was trying hard to stonewall herself again, but he was bound and determined to get her to talk it all out. He squeezed her hand to let her know he was there for her as he carefully chose his next words.

"If you love him, Alyssa, you have to tell him. Give him a reason to want to stay."

The words pierced through the remnants of the broken walls she was desperately hoping to rebuild. This was unfamiliar territory for her, living in her feelings, and it was beginning to frighten her, but she didn't know how to stop it.

Tears filled her eyes, and Bobby readied himself to take her in his arms again and hold her.

"I do love him. I know I do. But how do you make someone fight to save their own life when you're too exhausted and defeated yourself to fight with them?"

"What do you mean?" Bobby wasn't sure where she was going with the conversation, but at least he'd gotten her to admit she did love Dean.

"I heard something in my head earlier today."

"You're mother's voice again?"

"No. It was a whisper from inside me. At least, I think it was."

"What did it say?" Bobby knew about her mother's spirit latching onto Alyssa and guiding her all these years. There were times when Alyssa would just sit for hours and stare off into nothing. He realized later on, after she'd admitted to hearing a voice in her head that she was talking to her mother, even though her mother had been dead since she was ten.

"It said 'this would be the last'."

"What do you suppose that means?"

"I wish I knew for sure. I'm almost afraid to find out."

Bobby was about to suggest his own interpretation of what she'd heard, but he never got the chance.

He would swear up and down in a court of law that Alyssa's eyes went jet black, almost like she was possessed.

"Alyssa?" he prodded her with a light shake to her right shoulder, but she didn't respond to him. She only stared at the wall, but not really at the wall. It seemed as though she was looking through it. And as soon as it had started it was over, and her eyes returned to their normal brown.

"Call Sam." She left Bobby sitting speechless at the table and ran up the stairs to her room.

"What the hell was that, Alyssa?" he called after her, retrieving his cell phone from his left jacket pocket.

She ignored his question, not wanting to forget one detail of the vision. If she neglected to recall even the most minor detail, everyone she loved would die.

Alyssa hastily dug through her leather bag and pulled out her sketchbook and pencils. She left her other belongings scattered across the bed, forgotten until later.

Bobby heard her frantic footsteps coming down the stairwell as he found Sam's number on his contact list.

"What the hell is this all about? And what the hell happened to you?"

"A vision." She sat down hard at the table and flipped through the pages of the book, searching for the next clean page. Finding one, she spilled the pencils from her hand across the table, selecting the closest one to her to begin.

Alyssa scratched lines across the page, none of them making any sense until they were connected with other lines. She was completely engrossed in what she was doing, not paying any attention to the older man looking over her shoulder.

"What the hell?" Bobby could see the images coming to life on the page. "Holy crap." It was the last thing he said before he hit the number on his phone and waited for Sam to pick up.


	17. Chapter 17

**Chapter Seventeen**

Sam had just finished up with the story of the battle with the Yellow-Eyed Demon, the opening of Hell's Gate, the ensuing war, and all the pertinent events that had occurred since when his phone went off.

"Excuse me," he said to Chester and James as he rose from the couch and made his way to the kitchen to take the call. It was Bobby calling, so he knew it must be important.

"Hey, Bobby." He started, but he never got to say another word until Bobby had finished describing the images in Alyssa's new vision. "You sure?" Another moment passed before he hung up. "Thanks, Bobby. We'll take it from here." He ended the call and pocketed his phone.

How would he explain this to Dean? Alyssa's visions were dead on, never wrong. But this one wasn't going to be easy to handle. He had to get him in the kitchen without raising any alarms in the other two men.

Well, here goes nothing, he said to himself. He came around the corner wall from the kitchen leading to the living space. "Dean, can I speak with you please?" He gave Chester and James a quick grin to portray that everything was okay, but his eyes told another story altogether.

Dean shrugged his shoulders, but casually made his way to the kitchen wondering what was up with his younger brother.

"What's going on, Sam?" He could see the urgency and concern in Sam's eyes. He, too, was now on edge.

"We've got a serious problem. That was Bobby on the phone."

"When isn't it serious when he calls?"

"Alyssa had a vision."

Dean's heart skipped a beat, remembering the last few times she'd had visions. Was she okay? Did something in her vision attack her again? The questions ran through his mind and settled deep within his heart. The anger with himself for allowing harm to come to her in the first place rose once again. He would do anything, even abandoned the two fellow hunters in the other room to their grisly fate, if she needed him to, and for the first time since she'd come back into his life, he knew what he felt was real. If he lost her, his world would be as dark as when he'd lost Sam.

He finally found his voice, "Is she okay?"

"She's fine, Dean." He knew his brother had something deeper for her than he was willing to admit, but maybe now he'd recognized it was there, so evident in his concern for her safety first. "The vision was of us, here, now."

"What about us?" Dean felt the relief flood through him. Alyssa was fine; it had been an ordinary vision, if having visions could be considered ordinary.

"The demon is already here." Sam didn't know just how blunt he should be. Considering what he'd heard from Bobby, time was of the essence, and the battle was about get bloody. "It's in the kid."

"What? Is Alyssa sure?" The news that the kid was their target complicated matters immensely.

"She's sure. And it's not going to be an easy fight."

"Never is with demons." Dean looked around the kitchen and peeked into the back rooms. "Doesn't look like there's a Devil's Trap in here, and we don't have time to draw one without getting ourselves killed by demon boy in there. So now what?"

"Should we tell his dad?"

"Do you think he'd believe us? How do we tell him we know? We just show up on his doorstep, announce he's in danger, and now we have to tell him his kid is the one who's going to try and kill him." Dean could see the desperation and futility of their situation. "What did Alyssa see?"

"Bobby didn't give me the details, but he did say that it was going to get bad. Real bad."

While Sam and Dean were discussing their next move, the Rowland men were considering their own options.

"They're talkin' a lot in there," James looked to his father.

"Yeah. I know," he, too, was a little suspicious of what the Winchesters could be talking about in his kitchen. He had half a mind to go in there and demand to know what was going on, but he didn't want to leave his son alone.

"I think we're better off on our own. We should just send them away, Dad. We can take care of ourselves, we always have since Mom died."

"They're the Winchester, James. They've been at this their whole lives. They have years more experience than we do, son."

"Well, if they're so good, why isn't their dad here with them?" James smarted off.

"You hush your mouth, boy." Chester warned his son. It wasn't like James to cop an attitude and mouth off to him. "John Winchester was a hell of a hunter. He trained those boys, just like I'm training you." He suddenly felt that something was terribly wrong. "I'm going to go and see what the hell is going on. You stay here, boy." He got up from the recliner and headed towards the kitchen to join the Winchesters, eyeing his son as he left the room.

"Mr. Rowland," Sam acknowledged the arrival of the older man with the tilt of his head.

"Boys." he nodded back. "If there's something going on I need to know about, I'd appreciate it if you would fill me in. You are in my house, and I have the right to know."

Sam and Dean looked to each other for support, shrugged their shoulders, and began. Dean went first.

"You're son is possessed." He wasn't pulling any punches, because Chester Rowland didn't seem like the kind of man who appreciated beating around the bush.

"What?"

Sam continued, "We have it on good authority that your son has been possessed by the demon who's killing hunters across the country. We tracked the attacks heading west, and you were next in line. Somehow, it got into James."

"On whose authority?"

"What?" Dean looked surprised at the question.

"Who told you my son is possessed? I want a name."

"Well, she's a hunter. Like us." Sam answered when Dean didn't offer anything.

"A woman?" Chester's true side was about to be revealed. "Women can't do this job. They're too fragile, too emotional to handle what we do."

"You don't know this woman," Dean chuckled mostly to himself, but Chester heard him loud and clear.

"So, you know this woman personally, then?"

"Very personally. And I trust her and what she sees." Dean stated sternly. He did trust her with his life.

"So she sees things?" Chester crossed his arms and watched as the two men before him shook their heads to acknowledge he was correct. "She psychic?"

"Not a psychic, sir." Sam was doing his best to come up with a way to describe Alyssa without going into too much detail. "She's, let's say, gifted."

"She has visions, she can dream walk, and she can kick demon ass." Dean was tired of being politically correct.

"But she's not here. So how am I supposed to trust what she says?" Chester wasn't taking anything they said seriously without some kind of corroborating evidence.

"Look, Chester. I've been in fights with Alyssa, and I would rather have her here covering our backs than you and your son and half a dozen other hunters." Dean stood up straighter, daring the man to challenge him.

"She must be pretty tough, but she's still a woman. How can a woman fight as well as a man?" Chester wasn't letting up, still not sure he should trust the Winchesters and some mystery woman who seemed to tell these two men where to go and what to do.

"Doesn't matter anymore, Chester. If my girlfriend says it's going to happen, then it's going to happen. No questions asked."

"So, the truth comes out. She's your girlfriend, which now makes me think this really is a scam." His eyes narrowed at the Winchester brothers, his hand moving slowly into position to pull the gun he had hidden in the back of his pants.

"Don't even think about it, Chester." Sam already had his own gun in hand, pointing directly between the eyes of the man who now made himself a threat.

"Well, well. It looks like the game has already started," the young voice came from behind Chester.

Chester turned around slowly to face his son standing in the doorway to the kitchen. Sam and Dean let him back up between them, standing three against one. Sam lowered his gun, not wanting to accidentally pull the trigger on the teenager.

James' eyes were as black as the night that surrounded the house. The smile across his face wasn't a normal human smile; it was malicious, maniacal, and just downright evil.

"James?" Chester kept himself calm, knowing his son was somewhere in the body that stood before him. He didn't want to do anything that would jeopardize the life of his son, but he didn't want to let the evil force keep him either.

"Hiya, Pop." The demon's eyes changed back to their normal brown, but the general look on his face still held the intent of pure chaos and terror. "Finally get to meet you Winchesters. You're reputation precedes you, but I don't really see what all the fuss is about."

"Where's my son?"

"He's in here with me. Of course, he's so worried about hurting his daddy," the smile grew wider, showing more of his teeth, and looked even more malicious than before.

"Get out of my son." Chester growled at the demon child.

"Not so fast there," he moved a few steps forward, relishing in seeing the three men before him moving as many steps backward. "I'm not quite finished with you three. It's poetic justice, you know, having three of you here. I get the next hunter on my list, and as an added bonus, the Winchesters. All in one fell swoop."

James moved even closer to the hunters, cornering them in the kitchen with no way out but the door that led to the back yard.

Dean leaned a bit to his left and spoke low, "Do you have a Devil's Trap in here somewhere?"

Chester thought for a few seconds, "No."

That wasn't the answer he was hoping for.

James drew a bit closer to Dean, wanting to know what was on the Winchester's mind. "You smell like her."

"What?" Dean seemed offended, but then he quickly figured out to whom the teenager was referring. "I don't smell like a girl." He held his jacket lapel to his nose and sniffed. "Smells like leather to me."

"You know where she is." It was a statement more than a question.

"Who?" Dean played the game, hoping to buy them more time to figure out a way to exorcise the demon, get the kid and his dad, and get back to Alyssa and Bobby. Alyssa had seen something, but hadn't given them details, which probably meant it wasn't going to end well. He had to think of something or hope Sam came up with an idea before someone got killed.

"You know, too." James turned to Sam. "And you wanted her for yourself."

This struck both Winchesters to the core. How did this demon know what had transpired with Alyssa over six months ago?

"What is he talking about?" Chester saw the look on his guests' faces. "This ain't about me any more, is it?" He aimed the question at his son.

"Oh, it's about you alright, but these two are the icing on the cake."

As the conversation had begun with the murderous demon, Sam had been digging into his highly educated brain to think of way for them to all survive this encounter. He'd heard Dean ask Chester about the Devil's Trap and also heard the disheartening negative response. They had to regroup out of sight and sound of the demon so they could formulate a plan.

"Is there an outside entrance to the basement?" Sam whispered as loud as he could.

"Yes, there is." Chester's hopes were rising as he now knew the Winchesters were thinking. At least someone was. He was still in shock from seeing his only son under the influence of an evil entity. He'd lost his daughter, and then his wife, to the supernatural crap out there in the world. He had sworn on his own life that he would train his son to protect himself and fight back when the time came. And now that time had come, but his son hadn't been prepared properly. He'd failed as a hunter, a trainer, and as a father. "James, if you're in there. We'll find a way to get you back."

Chester turned tail and ran to the back door just to the left of the fridge, threw open the door, and headed outside. He wasn't waiting to see if Sam and Dean were following; for he knew they would be just as fast as they're own legs would carry them. He ran around the left side of the house to the storm cellar and threw open the doors. He heard the footsteps of the men behind him.

"Close the door and lock it with this!" He threw Dean a large padlock intricately engraved with symbols. Dean, in turn, threw it to Sam, who promptly locked the storm cellar doors.

"I know where you are!" They heard the teen's voice calling to them from outside. "Daddy, don't you love me?" The laughter that followed was indicative of the mental instability of a madman.

"That's not your son, Chester." Dean could see the look of desperation in the man's face and knew what he was thinking, but he had to remind him his son was not there right now.

"I know." He turned away from them, heading to the darkened corner of the storm cellar.

Sam and Dean took a moment to take in their surroundings. The cellar was stocked with food and supplies just like any normal storm cellar in the Midwest would be. However, amongst the cans of non-perishables and barrels of distilled water were duplicates of the weapons they'd seen when they first walked into the Rowland home and many more items: knives with ancient engravings, more bags of rock salt, and stacks of ammunition boxes.

Chester reappeared from the shadows, "In here."

Dean led the way to what seemed to be a secret room. Sam closed the door behind them reading the Latin inscriptions that had been burned into the wood.

"We're safe in here, for now." Chester mumbled to no one in particular. He was grabbing guns from different shelves and loading them from their assigned ammunition supply boxes. In was in his own nightmare now; his son was one of them. He knew there were only two possible outcomes to this situation: his son is saved or his son dies. Either way, Chester had the feeling this would be his final battle.

While he made peace with himself and God, Sam and Dean worked out their next move.

"Well, now what?" Dean muttered.

"Dean, why didn't that demon just pin us to the wall like they always do?"

"What?" His brother was on a mental tirade of his own. He'd called Alyssa his girlfriend, and for some reason, it felt right to say it. He was sure Sam had heard him say the "g" word, and he would probably hear about it later, which was fine with him. They needed to get out of this alive, first, and then the teasing could begin.

"Why didn't the demon hold us like the rest of them always did?"

"I don't know, Sam." Dean began rummaging through the inventory of the room to find something they could use against the demon. They needed chalk to outline a devil's trap somewhere and perform the exorcism. It was the best way to keep the kid alive and get rid of the demon.

"He could have held us while he carved up Chester. But why didn't he?" Sam was asking the questions of himself as well as of his brother, hoping one of them would come across a believable explanation.

"Maybe he's not strong enough."

Sam stopped his train of thought and considered what Dean had proposed. If the demon were not strong enough to hold all three of them then it would mean he was a young demon, kind of like a newborn baby. That thought brought him back to Alyssa and even more questions.

"How did he know about Alyssa?" Sam whispered to Dean, keeping out of earshot of Chester, who was now busy sharpening large hunting knives.

"That creeps me out, too." Dean found a spray paint can, not what he'd hoped for, but it would have to do. "He must have heard about her from other demons who were in Arkansas with Yellow Eyes."

"But he said we smelled of her, Dean. And how the hell did he know about what happened?"

Dean was confused, and he didn't like to be confused, especially when they were in the midst of a battle with a demon. He needed to get his younger brother off his back and focused on the task at hand. "Sam, right now, we need to concentrate on getting this thing out of that kid. Then we can figure out all the rest."

"You're right." Sam began to do his own search for the items they would need to do an exorcism.

Oblivious to the conversation happening behind him, Chester dwelled within the mistakes of the past. He'd lost his wife over five years ago. The police reports stated she was attacked by a pack of dogs, but the explanation never did sit right with him. After months of searching, he'd discovered the truth of what had happened to his beloved wife, which was much more frightening than the ignorance blinding the local police department. And just last year, his daughter had disappeared, never to be seen again.

"Chester, we need to get a plan together to get the demon in a trap and do the exorcism." Dean approached the older man, paint can and holy water in hand.

"What do you suggest, Mr. Winchester?" He turned around, a large bowie knife in his right hand; his dark brown eyes seemed empty of all emotion, as if he'd already signed his own death certificate.

Dean hesitated a moment, realizing the man who stood before him now was a reflection of what he'd felt like recently. In his eyes, he saw himself, the lack of caring anymore, the desperation to save a loved one, and the decision to make a final stand were all there. It was frightening to see himself standing before him.

Sam stepped up next to his brother, in his hands a bottle of Holy Water and a loaded shotgun.

"Will James survive the exorcism?"

"As long as James is strong enough to handle it, he'll make it. And we'll do our best to keep him safe."

"Have you done many exorcisms, boys?" Chester stared at the men wondering if they were worthy of saving his son.

"A few." Dean answered.

"How many made it?"

"A few," Dean repeated.


	18. Chapter 18

**Chapter Eighteen**

The three men, armed to the teeth with anything and everything they could carry, exited the hidden room, and made their way back to the main part of the house. This time, though, they followed Chester from the storm cellar into the basement towards the stairs that led to the kitchen above them.

Dean stopped the procession of hunters, shaking the can of spray paint. He found the perfect spot in the basement, a clear section of cement flooring, allowing him the space to make a rather substantial devil's trap.

He bent over, pointed the can at the floor and began to create the snare from memory. Having drawn it so many times before, the production of the trap was nothing more than mere repetition of movements.

Sam and Chester waited for Dean to finish the complex lines ensuring the activation of the spell. Chester was impressed with the knowledge of the two Winchesters. John, whom he had only known briefly but word of him had spread through the hunting community, had trained his sons well. He hoped he would get the chance to teach his own son everything he had learned so far, but he also knew he himself had so much more to learn and pass on to James.

While Dean was painting the floor with the lines and symbols that made up the trap, he was mentally going over his own plan for getting the demon into the trap. They needed to get him downstairs, into the basement, and into the circle all without getting themselves, Chester, or James killed. It wasn't going to be easy. Demons just didn't willingly walk into a trap, although it would have made life so much easier for all of them if they did.

Knowing full well the possible outcomes of what they were about to do, Dean took the lead and headed up the basement stairs with his brother following close behind. Bringing up the rear of the hunter procession was a very stoic Chester Rowland.

He knew one of two things was going to happen. Either his son survived this or he didn't, but he was going to do everything in his power to make sure his son did survive, or he'd die with him.

Sam was going over the exorcism in his mind, reciting the ritual incantation from memory. He didn't want to miss one word, mispronounce one vowel, or forget a line. The life of a young man was now in their hands. It shouldn't seem out of place for a life to depend on him and his brother, but for some reason, this was more important than ever. Sam reasoned it had to do with what the demon had said before, that they smelled of her. He knew in his heart the demon was referring to Alyssa and what had transpired between them so many months before. He loved her as a sister and felt a wave of protection of her and his unborn nephew overwhelm him, and he hoped his brother felt the same way.

Dean wasn't thinking of anything more than surviving the night. His instincts had taken over, making him aware of every movement and sound in the house. If they did survive this battle, then he'd worry about other things, like Alyssa. He couldn't afford to let his concern for her fog his mind, dulling his senses, and possibly get him or Sam killed. So he buried her in the back of his mind, tightened his grip on the weapons in his hands, and slowly opened the door to the mayhem before them.

Dust swirled throughout the house dancing in the flickering light hanging precariously from the kitchen ceiling. The house resembled the aftermath of a bomb having exploded within its walls. The curtains over the kitchen sink had been shredded to pieces, the curtain rod hanging askew trying to hold onto the tattered remains of a memory. Cupboard doors hung on their hinges, the dishes, bowls, and glasses shattered across the countertops and floor. The kitchen table and chairs were nothing more than splinters.

Sam came up behind Dean, covering the right side as Chester made his way to the door to survey the damage to his home.

Just as the three hunters entered the living area, the front door to the home fell from its hinges, crashing to the floor. Sam and Dean whipped around, their weapons in hand, their faces a masked mixture of fear and courage.

"Wow! He's really pissed off this time." The young Rowland stood in the doorway, waving his hands in the air, scattering the dust particles away from his face. He stepped over the threshold entering the war zone, ignoring the threatening posture of the three hunters before him. "Haven't seen him do this much damage since..."

"Who's 'him'?" Dean questioned the demon, waiting for the inevitable wave of a hand that would send his body careening across the room, smashing into the wall. "Didn't you do this?" He gestured to the mess surrounding them.

"Me? Do this? No way. Not my style." James' head shook as the demon denied his part of the devastation.

"What is your style?" Sam questioned.

The young man's face contorted with an evil grin. "Usually very bloody, and quick. I have a schedule to keep, you know."

"Right. A schedule," Dean mused. "So if you didn't do this, who did?" He cocked his head towards the destruction.

James looked around, eyeing the ceiling, the stairs leading to the second floor of the house, and staring down the humans who stood before him. "Come out, come out, wherever you are," he chimed in a singsong voice.

The air seemed to electrify. A wind blew through the house, again scattering the dust and debris around the hunters.

Sam, Dean, and Chester shielded their eyes the best they could without leaving themselves unguarded. Once the chaos had settled a bit, Dean was the first to notice a new addition to the party. Standing off to the left, amid the broken furniture and shredded books stood the figure of a young man. His brown hair was disheveled, with strands falling into his eyes with every movement.

Sam knew he was looking at a spirit, but somehow he knew he was looking at someone from his past. The familiarity of the young man's eyes was overwhelming. He had seen those eyes before, but from where he could not remember.

"So what's this, your puppy?" Dean gestured towards the spirit.

"Not really. More like my protégé. He's quite the student, this one." James sauntered over to the spirit, seemingly proud of his creation.

Chester watched his son's body make its way across the room to stand next to the disembodied soul. His hatred for the demon and any one or thing associated with it grew hot within his chest, spreading heat throughout his limbs, igniting his anger. He no longer wanted to stand by and let idle conversation keep him from securing his son's safety, but just in case the men with him were right, he urged himself to wait. His patience would eventually pay off, and if not, then he'd go down in a blaze of glory taking everyone in the room with him.

"Well he's not housebroken?" Dean smarted off, looking around at the damaged home. He was hoping to buy them some time to come up with another plan. They hadn't expected a demon-ghost tag team, so the original idea of driving the demon downstairs into the trap was pretty much out the window.

"That's okay. He's well worth his weight in blood." James leaned closer to the young man's spirit, speaking low, but still loud enough for the hunters to hear. "Do you remember the one who killed you? Do you remember her face?"

The spirit's glare faded as he seemed to step back into his own memories. Her face clouded his vision. His last moments on this earth were etched into his mind for all eternity.

She had tried to keep him from his destiny, tried, but failed, to change him. The Yellow-Eyed Man had courted him for months, telling him he was special, revealing his future as one of fame, glory, riches, and power. But she refused to let him have what was meant for him, refused to let him go. And in the end, she'd been the one to destroy him, murdering him in cold blood, as if he were just another thing to hunt and kill.

Sam had a hunch in the beginning, but now it was pretty much confirmed. He knew the identity of the ghost. Without drawing too much attention to himself, Sam moved closer to his brother. "Dean, I know who that is."

"Well, don't make me play twenty questions. Who the hell is it?" He seethed.

"Zach. Alyssa's brother." The actuality of a spirit teaming up with a demon was mind-boggling in and of itself, but now the tables were truly upturned, as this particular spirit could possibly have its own agenda for being on the physical plane.

"You're kidding me."

"No. It's him. I saw the picture of the family back in Arkansas. That's him."

"Crap. Now what?" Dean couldn't think of her now. If he did, he might give something away to the demon or his patsy that could put her in danger. They had to stop them now, before things truly got worse.

"Plan A." Chester whispered from behind.

Sam and Dean looked back at him.

"We get James safe first, then deal with the spook."

"Time for the games to begin." James' voice announced.

Chester stepped between the Winchesters and pulled a pistol from behind his back, aimed at the spirit, and pulled the trigger. The blast echoed through the house, scattering the spirit upon contact with the rock salt round.

"NO!" Sam shouted, but he was too late.

"What the...!" Dean yelled at the older man.

"Not nice to cheat, Chester." James' eyes shifted black. His hand moved through the air sending Chester careening across the room into the wall, holding him there just a few feet off the ground.

It took a moment for Chester to recover from the blow to his head as it had contacted the wall. The stars in his eyes diminished as the throbbing behind his temples began. Gritting his teeth together, he was able to grunt, "Let go of my son."

"Looks like Daddy's jumping the gun a little. Feeling desperate, are we?" James approached his victim, a murderous look on his face. "I was looking forward to negotiating with your lives, and now you've ruined it. He's not going to be very happy about you shooting him, so now it's going to get messy and very painful." Through his meat suit's eyes, he stared at the father. A voice trapped in the darkness of the young hunter's mind screamed for mercy, begged him to let his father go. "On second thought, I think I'll enjoy that even more."

Dean itched to jump at James but knew full well he wouldn't make it very far before he, too, was trapped just like Chester.

Sam had made a mistake in his previous assumption of the demon's abilities. The demon wasn't young and inexperienced. Instead, he was enjoying teaching Zach's spirit to relish in murdering people, especially hunters, singling them out as prime game. Alyssa. Would what she do when she found out her brother's spirit wasn't resting? Instead, it was following the lead of a demon.

"How'd you get out of the pit with the ghost?" Dean's voice cut through the tension.

"When you yahoo's opened the gate, I made sure to be as close to the exit as possible. Ghost-boy here had somehow crawled out but didn't have a clue what to do next. So, I offered him a deal. Team up with me, wreak some havoc and chaos, and he'd be rewarded well."

"I am so sick of everyone blaming that on us. We didn't open the damn gate!" Dean was still thinking of a way to get themselves out of the mess Chester had thrust upon them. If only he'd waited a little longer before going ballistic, they'd probably be in better shape right now.

"Whatever." James seemed to tire of the game.

Chester fell from the wall, slumping to the floor.

"Chester, you okay?" Dean moved closer to the older man.

"Fine," he grunted, refusing the hand Dean held out to him.

A roar echoed through the house, and just as suddenly as he'd disappeared, Zachary manifested before them. Only now, he was closer, and he was pissed.

Sam was desperate to protect everyone involved, but most of all Alyssa, and without any other way to survive this, it would most likely be their best shot at making it out alive. "Zachary," he turned his attention to the spirit standing before them, "she didn't want to do it."

"Going to try and send him into the light, Sam?" James chuckled at the feeble attempt of the hunter to placate the vengeful apparition.

Ignoring the demon, Sam continued his plea with Zach's spirit. "She did everything she could to save you, Zach."

For the first time since he'd escaped the bowels of Hell, Zach had something to say. "What if I didn't want to be saved? What if I wanted to be what I was destined to be? She had no right to take that choice from me."

"What the demon was offering you wasn't worth it. Trust me, I know."

"What he was being offered was worth dying for. He would have been the leader of our army. There's no greater honor." James seethed, offended at Sam's perception of the promise made to the chosen children.

Sam remembered what was needed to earn the so-called honor of being the leader of the demon army. Ava, Andy, Lily, Jake, and countless others had lost their lives in the battle for the top spot. "No, it wasn't worth it. Too many people died for the illusion of power."

"With my power, I could have ruled the world," Zachary growled. "The man with the yellow eyes said I would."

"He lied. He promised me the same. He also promised the same to several others who all died. All of them, including me." Sam continued.


	19. Chapter 19

**Chapter Nineteen**

"This is taking too long." Alyssa paced the floor, anxious to know what was happening with the boys. "I can't take it anymore." She grabbed her jacket and leather bag, heading for the door.

"Where the hell do you think you're going?" Bobby emerged from the kitchen, holding a plate of food, having prepared a light meal for his adopted daughter.

"I'll be back. Hopefully, with them behind me." She wanted to waste no more time thinking, no more time waiting to find out the worst had happened.

"Hold on a minute," he set the plate down on the table. "Just what do you think you're going to do when you get there?"

"I don't know, Bobby, but it beats the hell out of waiting around here for some grand catastrophe to blow through the door." She was impatient. She wanted to get going, needing to get to Dean and make sure he was still alive. In this situation, no news was not good news.

"Hit the brakes, kid!" Bobby had never demanded obedience from Alyssa, as he knew it would end in a battle of wills he would most likely have lost time and time again. But now, he was putting his foot down and making a stand as a highly trained hunter and father. "We don't know what's happening. We know nothing at this point. So, running off half-cocked isn't going to end well for anyone." He wasn't just thinking of Alyssa but also of her unborn child.

Alyssa fumed at Bobby's sudden change in demeanor. He'd never stood up to her before, especially when she was hell bent and ready to fight.

"Not knowing anything is what's driving me crazy. At least if I were there, I'd know if anyone was injured or dead." She choked on the last word, fear roiling within her gut. Being left behind was worse than being thrown in the midst of a fight with no weapons. She couldn't stand not knowing what was going on with those she cared about.

"What if you could find out what's happening?" Bobby wasn't sure what he meant by that, but he was hoping she would. He was up to trying any tricks he could to keep her home, with him, and safe.

"My abilities usually require someone to be asleep." Alyssa punctured the air with her words, stunned at how Bobby had forgotten what she could do. After everything they'd been through with the demon and her sponge-like absorption of others' powers, she was pretty clear about what she had left when she'd made the decision to keep her son. But just in case he had forgotten, "I'm not what I used to be, Bobby. I gave all that up. Remember?"

"I know. But you've got some talent you were born with. So find it, and use it." He was usually gentle and supportive when he spoke with Alyssa, not wanting to ruffle her feathers simply out of fear of what she could do to him. This, however, was not the time for being delicate with her emotions. They needed to know what was going on with Sam and Dean, and they needed to know now, but her safety was of the utmost importance to him at this moment. If she left and something happened to her, he would never forgive himself for not trying to prevent it.

"What are you suggesting? I pull a rabbit out of my magic hat?" He was hoping for a miracle, as was she, but she knew they were both going to be very disappointed.

"Not a rabbit, but maybe a thought, an idea, a vision; something that can help."

"I'm not some magician who can make things appear out of thin air. And I resent the assumption as such."

"I know that, girl. What I'm sayin' is you might have some way to do some thing and not know it." He set his hand on hers as she still gripped the doorknob, her knuckles turning white. "You can walk into people's dreams. Maybe you can walk into their thoughts as well." His blue eyes pleaded with her to try and understand just how desperate he was to protect his family.

Alyssa stared into the older man's eyes: the eyes she had come to know and love over the many years. In those blue orbs, she could see the pain he would feel if he lost her and the desperation to protect her. She recognized that look for it was the same look she'd seen on her own father's face that horrible night so long ago: the night he'd killed his own wife. The familiar blow to her chest was the shattering of her heart, once again.

So many people had been affected by her very existence: the lives she'd saved, the lives she couldn't save, and then those who loved her with more heart than she'd ever seen before. Those faces flashed in her memory as she contemplated what Bobby was asking of her. A small kick resounded through her body as the baby growing in her womb did not want her to forget him in her thoughts. She released the doorknob, held Bobby's hand within her own for a moment, and resolved to do whatever she could to do as he asked and protect their family.

"So what now?"

Bobby sighed heavily, knowing she was making a decision she would probably regret or maybe later blame him for, "Let's find out what you can do."

Alyssa sat in a chair, her back straight, with her bare feet on the floor. Across from her in another chair, Bobby sat as well, not sure of what he could do to assist her.

"You sure about this?" Alyssa's stonewall resolve was crumbling without her permission. She had to find the control within herself to attempt something she'd never tried before, but she needed to know she wasn't alone in her skepticism.

"Couldn't hurt to try, little girl." Bobby could see she was falling apart at the seams. If he didn't give her all his love and support, she would surely fail, and it would cost them their lives. "You can do this, Alyssa. I know you can."

His blues eyes pierced her soul, sending all his strength and faith into her very core. He believed in her, so she knew she had to believe in herself as well.

Confident she could do what Bobby asked of her, Alyssa calmed herself, bringing her consciousness to the center of her being. She closed her eyes slowly, not really wanting to let go of the image of her adopted father in front of her, his own eyes pleading with her to succeed.

Bobby sat helpless, uncomfortable, almost feeling out of place in front of Alyssa. As she had closed her eyes, he breathed a sigh of relief for she had finally summoned the courage to take on a task she'd never before attempted, but the biggest hurdle he cleared was getting her stay put. As she visibly relaxed in the chair, the air around them seemed to hum like a refrigerator in the background. Bobby squirmed a bit in his chair, but no matter how uncomfortable he became, it was going to take a tornado blowing through the house to unseat him.

Alyssa blocked out the world around her: the sounds of the house settling, the breeze whistling through the dilapidated cars outside, and the nervous breathing of the man in front of her all seem to melt away.

She didn't like doing her "thing" in front of other people unless it was absolutely necessary and the situation called for nothing less. She preferred the quiet solitude of an empty room, the calming effects of the burning incense, and the colored candles she used to perform her "magic".

After months of practice, Alyssa found the way to walk into other people's dreams without the need for herbal or pharmaceutical assistance. And now she called upon that same practice to delve into the minds of others while still conscious.

As she fell deeper into her meditative trance, Alyssa's body tingled, her limbs growing heavier. Entering the familiar domain of her inner mind was like stepping into a childhood home; images and memories of times past flashed before her. She gently pushed those thoughts aside, training her energy on the vast blackness she could see beyond the thoughts of what she was attempting and why.

She concentrated on entering her version of a "jump-off" point. The blackness enveloped her, erasing the memories, quieting her thoughts, and calming her. It was just like before when she'd been able to stop the demon using the dark blanket in her mind to ease her pain, anger, and sorrow. But this time, she used it as a doorway to the subconscious minds of others.

Alyssa stood at the edge of the darkened realm, looking into the fog before her. Somewhere out there were the minds of Sam Winchester and Dean Winchester. She had to find one of them, hopefully still alive and conscious enough to talk to her.

Taking a deep breath and picturing his green eyes, short dark blond hair, his near perfect lips, she moved her right foot forward and stepped into the misty oblivion.

"The plot thickens, Sam. Got anything to say about that?" The demon boy calmly observed from his perch on the decimated remains of the sofa the feeble attempts of one Sam Winchester to placate the angry spirit he'd toted around since they'd all been freed from Hell.

Sam furrowed his brow. How was he to explain to this spirit the damage that had been caused by the Yellow-Eyed Demon's plans? Would he understand how much his sister had truly suffered for her decision and every decision she'd made since? Sam doubted it, but he tried anyway.

"Zach, I was a part of the demon's plan. I know what he offered, but it was not worth the lives of the people we loved and all those innocent people who died because of it."

"I don't care about them." His brown eyes glared at Sam. "You promised me revenge." Zach turned to the demon-boy.

"And you shall have it, my friend."

Dean watched the exchange between Sam and Zach. Could he help his brother cool the spirit's heels? Would anything he had to say make a difference?

"These guys know where she is. They know where she's hiding." James' eyes darkened with the anticipation of the bloodshed to soon follow.

"Tell me where she is and I might let you live," Zach moved closer to Sam.

"Well, gee, I might believe you if you weren't bro-mancing a demon," Dean swung his shotgun towards the approaching spirit.

_Dean, _a voice shot through his head. _Can you hear me?_

The moment of disorientation gave Zach the advantage to dodge the shotgun and move up on the Winchesters, gripping Dean's throat in his hand.

"Where is she?" Zachary began to squeeze ever so slowly.

_Dean! _the voice sounded louder, closer.

"CRAP! NOT NOW!" Dean yelled back at the voice, fully aware he was being suffocated to death.

"Who are you talking to?" Zachary pulled himself closer to Dean's face, staring into his eyes.

"No one… Just my…irritable bowel syndrome…acting…up again." Dean tried to look anywhere but at the ghost.

_Dean, who is that? I know that voice._

"I can almost hear her." Zach searched deeper into Dean's eyes, as if he could see through him and out the other side.

_Dean? What is going on? Are you guys okay?_

"Can't…talk…now…a…little…busy?"

"Alyssa? Is that you?"

_No. It can't be. Not him._

"Oh, but it is my lovely sister. Come out and play with me now."

"Alyssa, no! Don't!" Dean pulled the shotgun up higher and pulled the trigger.

Zachary exploded into dust yet again.

While James had been watching the show-down between Dean and Zachary, Chester had maneuvered himself just behind his son. Sam had seen what was happening with Chester and placed himself near to the door leading to the basement. At the moment Dean pulled the trigger, Chester threw a bottle of Holy Water at James, watched as he started to scream and sizzle, and grabbed him by the pants and back of his shirt throwing him towards the basement door. Sam opened it up and kicked him the remaining way down, landing him right in the center of the Devil's Trap.

James awoke tied to a chair in the middle of a painted demon trap on the floor. The demon within him didn't have time to say a word before another splash of red hot Holy Water hit him in the face.

"ARRRRGHH!" he screamed, smoke billowing from his face and neck. He looked around for Dean, locking eyes with the Winchester. "I heard your little bitch has a bun in the oven."

Dean glared at the young man, not saying a word.

"What? No sharing sonogram pictures or morning sickness stories?"

Dean continued his silent vigil over the demon, waiting for something, but not sure what.

The demon cracked a grin that spread from ear-to-ear. "I know why he crawled out of the pit."

"So talk." Dean stood back as Chester readied another bucket of Holy Water. "Or sizzle."

"Let me go, and I'll tell you what Zachary is really aiming for."

Dean cocked his head towards the boy, a signal for Chester to douse him again.

After the screaming ended, and the boy was wet from head-to-toe, he again bartered for his freedom.

"Release me, and I'll tell you how to stop him, too."

"No deal. Talk or burn." Dean met eyes with Sam, "Any time you're ready, Sam."

Sam began reciting the exorcism prayer as Chester doused his son with more Holy Water.

Dean held up his hand to Sam and Chester, gesturing for them to pause their game of wet and chant. "You got something to say, now?"

Weakened, soaked, and apparently beaten, the demon residing in James seemed to be ready to give in, relinquishing his secret.

"What's Zachary game?" Dean leaned over the exhausted demon.

"A way back."

"What do you mean a way back?" Dean stepped back beyond the circle.

"A ghost looking for a way back into the land of the living. You figure it out, geniuses." And with that, he began to cackle maniacally.

Dean knew they'd gotten as much out of him as they were going to. It was time to put the demon back in hell and free James. "Sam, finish it."

Sam began to recite the exorcism ritual from memory. James' body bucked and moved in the chair as the demon was being ripped from him. Chester grimaced with every groan and scream that erupted from his son. One final sentence sent the demon roiling from James' mouth and into the painted trap beneath him.

Chester pushed past Sam, grabbing his son's unconscious head. "James, are you in there?"

Sam and Dean breathed a sigh of relief as James' voice echoed through the basement.

"Ok, he's back to normal. What the hell went on between you and Zach? It was like a three-way conversation, but I could only hear two of you." Sam helped his brother pack up their things.

"We need to get back to Bobby's and fast."

"Will you please fill me in on what's going on?"

"On the way," Dean heaved the packed duffle over his shoulder. "Chester, you got this now?"

"Yes," Chester had removed the bindings from his son's arms and legs. He held him tight in his arms, never wanting to let him out of his sight again. "How can I ever thank you for helping us?"

"Don't get possessed again would be a start."

Sam added his two-bits as well, "Update your sigils. And watch each other's back."

Chester closed the bedroom door, leaving his son to rest, under a blanket spray-painted with four different protection symbols.

"I don't know how to repay you."

Dean mind worked at warp speed wanting to get his hands on some of the extra supplies from the basement, but Sam's nudging elbow stopped him dead in his tracks.

"Chester, we're just relieved that the demon is gone, and you two are still alive."

"What happens with the ghost he was dragging around?" Chester walked the two brothers downstairs to the shattered remains of the living room. He scoped the room, waiting to see if Zach rematerialized to continue the fight. So far, the ghost stayed gone.

"Don't know. Not sure where he went." Dean's lie poured out of his mouth with nearly no effort. He knew damned well where that son-of-a-bitch was heading. They had to get there first.

"Well, Chester, we gotta get back to Bobby's. You take care of your son." Sam paused in the doorway as Chester ushered them out of his home. Chester took Sam's outstretched hand and shook it with strength and gratitude.

"You boys be safe."

Dean tipped his head, "Same to you," and headed out to the waiting Impala.

The brothers looked at each other over the top of the car, a silent understanding passing between them. The battle is far from over.

Chester watched the two men outside his home, waiting to buzz them out. He shivered to think of what could've happened to him and James if those two hadn't shown up. The car rumbled to life moving slowly towards the gate entrance. Chester pressed the button, allowing the car to leave his enclosed property. Just as he was turning away, he caught a glimpse of something in the back seat of the car. There had only been two men in the car when they arrived. Now there were three.


End file.
